


Take me somewhere nice

by sugarboat



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Ford has a Crush, M/M, Other, Pre-Betrayal, fluff-ish, mild to moderate body horror
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-17
Updated: 2017-12-08
Packaged: 2018-08-31 14:38:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 30,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8582266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sugarboat/pseuds/sugarboat
Summary: Bill edges Ford towards the creation of the portal.





	1. A toast to starry nights

Even in their first meeting, Bill is never shy about touching Ford. The memory is bright – a hand on his shoulder, on his _face_ , the triangle’s slight weight against him. Afterwards, Ford sits in his study, leaves and twigs still strewn through his hair from sleeping in the woods, and writes. 

What it feels like. 

Hot. Smooth. Pointy.

What it is. 

Black, like a hole cut in reality. Gold, brighter than the sun. 

Not flesh, not quite. Not stone. Some strange amalgamation of the two? 

Well dressed.

Weird.

He tears the page out, crumples it, and tries to start again.

Their second meeting is two weeks after the first. Just long enough that Ford has begun to think it had all been some vivid, lucid dream. Long enough to give him time to research said things, and he has in fact fallen asleep with several different books on the subject spread out beneath him on his desk. His eyes slip closed and Bill is touching him, a hand in his hair, a hand on his chin. Holding him still and snickering as he examines the red lines etched onto Ford’s face.

“You KNOW, if you have a QUESTION about DREAMS you can just ASK me, Sixer!” Sixer, Sixer. The nickname still bites but Ford’s sporting a grin anyway. “None of those CRACKPOTS are RIGHT anyway!” Bill lets him go. 

“Bill! I…” What? _I was worried. I thought I was losing my mind. I wanted to see you again._ “It’s been a while.”

The muse makes a mock frown. “Has it? Time is RELATIVE, Fordsy, you know that.” Something nudges the back of Ford’s knees, makes his legs wobble and he stumbles back into a chair. Their chess set pops into existence with a distinctive poof and within the span of a blink Bill is sitting across from him on the other side. “Let’s play a GAME and you can TELL ME all about your LATEST WORK! Surely it hasn’t ALL been focused on DREAMS!”

Ford shifts in his seat, embarrassed.

When he wakes up he peels his face off of the pages, closes the books and relegates them to the lowest shelf in his study. His journal is the only tome left on his workspace, open to a stubbornly blank page, and he wants to fill it with questions about his muse, but instead sits and begins to tentatively sketch out the laws of dreams. The dubious connection between the unconscious mind and the realm Bill occupies. The mindscape.

The underlying rules that seem to govern the mindscape are tenuous at best, and if Bill’s implications are to be believed, don’t really matter in the first place. The creature – his muse – has never been wrong thus far, but even so Ford finds it hard to accept that there is such a place that can exist without limitations or stipulations. It acts as an extension of his mind, at least partially, and Bill has said more than once that the sky’s not the limit – _not even close, IQ_ \- but still, Ford is hesitant. 

“Look! It’s EASY!” Bill is saying. His visits have steadily become more frequent, and Ford has begun to rely on seeing him at least twice a week. The topic of dreams doesn’t come up often for all that their entire acquaintanceship has existed solely within the realm of sleep. But occasionally Ford will have a new question – always seeking for some fundamental rule to give structure to this nebulous dimension – and Bill will always have an answer. 

Even if his answer doesn’t always make sense.

The triangle snaps his black fingers, and the stars begin to wink out, one by one by one. The sight stirs something visceral within Ford, panicking at the disruption of the night sky, and the tension cranking tight in his chest is only barely lessened by the curving gaze of his companion. A sudden breeze distracts Ford from his thoughts and he tears his focus away from the night sky, only to find himself on a beach, the world bright and sunny around them. 

Bill looks ridiculous, a one-eyed pair of sunglasses somehow on his face, one of those fruity drinks Ford has seen girls drinking held in one hand. Bizarrely, his bowtie has remained while his top hat has been replaced by the floopiest hat that might have ever been conceived. He slips the edge of a brightly colored and looping straw beneath the rim of his new accessory, and Ford briefly grimaces at the loud slurping noise the muse makes as he drinks. Pulling the beverage away with a satisfied sigh, Bill uses his free hand to tip his sunglasses down slightly, just so he can peer over the dark edge of them at the human.

“You like BEACHES, right?” Ford stares blankly as the triangle stops floating, drifts down to kick his feet in the sand. It’s true in a way; he does – or did - like beaches, but anymore they remind uncomfortably of Stanley. “You’re not exactly DRESSED for a BEACH DAY, are you? Don’t want any more SAND in your PANTS than you ALREADY have in there!” 

His tone is teasing, like Ford should take some offense to being said to have sand in his pants, and the man frowns, bristling slightly. But then Bill’s words seem to process fully, and oh. He could change that, couldn’t he? Wasn’t that what this was all about? Ford feels ridiculous, but he tries to imagine himself in a pair of swimming trunks – and with sunscreen - and the next time he blinks he can feel the ocean air on his bare skin, each grain of sand between his toes. 

It’s incredibly detailed, almost hyper realistic, and Ford can barely remember that he’s still asleep somewhere outside the endless coastline. The sun beating down on him feels like the same one he remembered from his days in Glass Shard Beach, gulls croaking unseen somewhere and otherwise everything is quiet save for the rhythmic rushing of the ocean, in and out. Bill hops off from the ground and swipes a single finger down the column of Ford’s nose, scrutinizing the white substance that comes away on his fingertip.

“It’s sunscreen, Bill,” Ford answers the unspoken question, smiling. A beach chair – two of them, interrupted by the bright stalk of an umbrella – has appeared while he wasn’t looking, and he flops gratefully into it. Bill doesn’t seem convinced.

“What good is all that MELANIN in your SKIN if you’re not going to USE IT?” He’s rubbing his forefinger and thumb together. Ford supposes that he has a point but all he does is shrug. 

“I thought you knew ‘lots of things,’” Ford says, using the air-quotes gesturing Bill is so fond of. The quip earns him a scowl but he can only laugh, already becoming used to the exaggerated posturing of his muse. As he’d assumed, the bad mood passes quickly, and Bill is plopping into the seat next to him. A sudden boldness claims him. “Here, do you want to try it?” 

Bill eyes him cautiously, but lifts, floating over to him. Ford spreads his legs and Bill settles on the seat between them, looking up over the rim of his glasses with an amused look. Ford swirls his finger, and the muse’s bricks reverse themselves, Bill effectively turning himself around. It’s difficult, but Ford tries not to feel ridiculous as he grabs a bottle of sunscreen that surely didn’t exist before, squeezes it out over his fingers and begins rubbing it along the smooth plane of Bill’s back.

He watches the subtle shifting of the triangle, the shiver that seems to start in one corner and radiate out across his form as Ford’s fingers trace across his surface, as slick lotion drips between the interstices of his bricks, and it’s only then that the human stops to wonder if this is uncomfortable for his muse. And only then, that this is the first time he has initiated contact between the two of them. 

“Um, this is all right?” Ford all but murmurs. His hands have stilled and he can’t help but to notice how warm Bill is between them. Perhaps it’s the sun. 

“Hmm? Oh, yeah, I can feel it WORKING already!” Bill says nonchalantly, and wiggles. Ford’s hands fall away as the muse rises again, flipping back around to face him once more. In the span of time that Ford couldn’t see them, a new pair of sunglasses have materialized in Bill’s hands, and the triangle’s eye is a gleaming curve as he places them on the man’s face.

“I don’t think you should be feeling anything, Bill; it’s preventative.” Small black hands are shoving gently at his shoulders, encouraging him to lean back. With a relaxed sigh, Ford complies, feeling the tension draining away. As he closes his eyes, the hands leave his skin, and he has a moment to think how ridiculous it is that he would want to nap on a beach inside a dream.

“It’s YOUR dream! Do whatever you want!” Followed by the obnoxious slurping sound. “HEY! I think I see a MERMAID!” 

Ford awakens to the cold chill of his empty shack, ice frosting along the glass window of the attic room. His mind is always racing, ready to start a new day, embrace the thrill of discovery once more, and this morning is no different. Yet he sinks into the covers, closes his eyes, chases the wisps of his fleeing dreams. He drifts for a while, but Bill has already gone.

After that, Ford is more willing to explore the possibilities of the mindscape. It’s a uniquely intoxicating feeling to warp the landscape around them and Bill never reacts with anything less than total enthusiasm. Sometimes the little triangle will pop up with suggestions, helping him sculpt, but usually he just watches, his eye wide and rapt with attention. Forests, rivers, fields that Ford had once explored with his brother, fantastical environments that have only ever existed in his imagination, spiraling towers and dizzying mountain heights. 

But Ford’s preferred setting is the starry swirling sky that he’d first known as his. It feels perfect for their conversations that always steer towards the bizarre and the conceptual, theoretical and loftier than physical statures can reach. Bill conjures items for them – chairs, tables, graphs and letters and numbers that shimmer in the air and react to Ford’s touches, cautious at first but then eager once he’s urged on by his muse. Praise might come quickly from his excitable companion, but it never seems contrived or insincere, and it fills Ford with a strange, buzzing warmth that starts in his chest. 

One day Bill summons up another creature.

“It’s so- it just _ludicrous, inane_!” Ford is saying. He’s pacing back and forth across a glossy tiled floor that had appeared in the middle of his mindscape, and Bill is floating nearby, eye curved in a decidedly amused manner. Usually it’s a sight Ford can appreciate but this time he knows the levity is aimed at his own frustration.

“What’d you call it again, Fordsy?”

“ _Hawkoctopus._ Unbelievable!”

And suddenly there it is, Ford equal parts flabbergasted and annoyed. What a stupid creature. His first thought is to shoo the feathered, tentacled beast away, and hope that it never returns again. But as it screeches in his face, Ford pauses, and turns to stare, stupefied, at Bill.

“You… you can just conjure them up? You’ve seen one?” Ford asks. Bill chuckles and snaps his fingers. The hawkoctopus vanishes mid-shriek. 

“Nah, never seen one IN THE FLESH, so to speak, I just PLUCKED it out of your THOUGHTS!” The triangle makes a strange gesture with his hand, and another anomaly – the Moth Man, unfortunately as shrouded in shadows as always - Ford has discovered in Gravity Falls materializes in front of him. “Why don’t you TRY IT OUT?” 

He frowns, concentrating, and there before him is one of the strange, skittering campfires that he had come across almost entirely by accident. It’s crackling and popping in annoyance. Without warning, there is a can of beans in Bill’s hand that he’s pouring over the flames, much to their apparent, gurgling pleasure. A bewildering sight, to be sure, one that Ford can’t help but to laugh at. 

It’s easier the second time, and the third and fourth. Soon enough, it’s almost instinctive to conjure up whatever new and fascinating thing he had encountered during his studies, practically showing off. And Bill’s expertise is always invaluable, giving guided hints as to how all these mysteries slot together, where Ford’s research is leading him. If he hadn’t been already, Bill becomes his most valuable resource, his partner. His friend, his confidant, the missing piece to the puzzle of Gravity Falls.

Ford distorts his mindscape, literally bringing to mind the image of a particularly nasty creature that he had wrangled with earlier in his waking hours. It is just as fitfully, frighteningly aggressive as when he encountered it, and the beast roars, his mindscape quaking with the force of it. The thing is a whirl of sharp teeth and claws, swiping at the empty air around it, and for a split second Ford has the chance to think that he has made a mistake, a terrible miscalculation.

But Bill grabs hold of it, and as Ford watches, arms and arms and arms split off from his muse’s black limbs, perfect copies of his original set, fingers stretching and gripping to subdue the creature. His single eye is furrowed with a glare, leveled at the angry beast Ford has dragged into his mind with him. Belatedly, Ford remembers just who is in charge here, and he stills the monster’s movements. Bill turns to look at him, his extra appendages still in place.

“Looks like we got a LIVE ONE, eh Fordsy?” Despite the muse’s words, Ford doesn’t have eyes for anything but Bill at the moment. Ever perceptive, Bill gives a chuckle, letting go of the summoned creature. His extra limbs move in an almost rippling pattern, reminiscent of after-images. “LIKE what you SEE THERE, SIXER?” 

Ford sputters, embarrassment making his face hot. “It-it’s not like that!”

“Not like WHAT?” 

“I didn’t mean... that is to say…” the human clears his throat, trails off. Those weird, spindly limbs stretch out towards him, hard grips on his arms, and Ford yelps as he’s lifted, dragged closer to his muse. Ford’s own hands raise almost automatically, and he finds himself with both palms planted firmly on Bill’s front plane. Is he always this hot? But his gaze, and his hands, rove back towards where these extra arms have sprouted from. Bill lets him go. “Fascinating.” 

It’s actually a little unnerving to be this close to Bill when he’s this size. Usually the triangle remains roughly the size of a house cat – or smaller sometimes, when Bill sits on his shoulder or head, swinging his legs or fluffing up his hair. He’d grown in size to deal with the monster, which Ford’s mind had dissipated as soon as they’d both lost interest. His singular eye is huge, and when his eyelid goes half-lidded as Ford’s fingers trail along his edges, feeling for some kind of junction where his arms join his body, Bill’s eyelashes brush against his skin.

“Buy a guy a DRINK first, will ya?” Bill teases, and Ford immediately flushes again. But Bill’s arms around him stop him before he can pull too far away. “Yeesh, relax IQ.” 

The slit pupil of Bill’s eye flits to look over Ford’s shoulder, flicking back to watching the man just as quickly, eye scrunching with amusement. Ford wants to turn and look, but Bill is putting all his arms to use, holding his chin, fingers twining in his hair, encircling him. He swallows around a sudden lump in his throat. Bill is just giving him a hard time, he knows, but he’s acutely aware of his own body, of how he can feel the heat that radiates off Bill through the layers of his clothing. How Bill’s fingers end in sharp tips, how his own are still wrapped around the triangle’s edges, and how absurd this all is.

There is a pair of hands on his sides, a pair at his waist, a pair trailing upwards along the dip of his spine. A shiver travels up and down his body, and his mouth feels dry. Ford’s fingers curl against Bill’s surface and experimentally he drags his blunt nails down and back up, scratching lightly at the smooth gold. A strange sensation follows the motion, like static at his fingertips, electricity sparking up his forearm. Ford licks his lips.

“Bill,” he says quietly, struggling with himself. It’s terrifying to be this close to his muse, for all that Bill invades his personal space as a near nightly basis. Despite his nerves, Ford has the urge to drag Bill even closer. He doesn’t, of course, and Bill trails a finger along his jawline.

“Well, Fordsy,” the triangle begins, and Ford is both excited and horrified. “I think you’re WAKING UP!” 

Disappointment wars with a bizarre relief. Ford pulls away to look around, watches his dreamscape becoming cloudy and nondescript. Something twitches violently in the corner of his vision, where Bill is, like his muse’s form is warping somehow, convulsing, but when he turns back in surprise to stare at him, the triangle appears as he always does, looking supremely pleased. For some reason, Ford thinks of Bill drinking, eating, his eye warping into a mouth filled with sharp-looking teeth.

“See you REAL SOON!” 

With a surge of bravery, Ford dives forward, but instead of meeting Bill’s surface he’s abruptly awake, sitting up straight in his bedroom, bright sunlight streaming through the window. It must be a trick of his mind, but Ford swears that he can hear Bill laughing.


	2. You'll know exactly where I am

Days and nights pass, with no sign of his muse. Ford is hunched over his journal one afternoon, sketching out a new monster, but his heart isn’t in it. His thoughts are distracted, constantly drifting to his last interaction with Bill. Those hands stroking along his back, digging bruises into his upper arms, pulling him so close that his entire body felt hot from the proximity. It feels like his heart skips a beat, and he sets his pen down, heaving a sigh, resting his head in his hands.

Regardless of what he tells himself – what he _has_ told himself – he finds himself replaying the moment again. The way Bill’s surface felt beneath his fingertips, the fluttering feeling of his lashes brushing against his skin. The half lidded look as his muse watched him, as Ford’s hands trailed up and down the sharp planes of his body. Half of him is embarrassed, ashamed of himself, mortified at the way he acted. And that part brays constantly, tells him that Bill is never coming back, has washed his hands of him in disgust. 

The other part just thinks of Bill’s curved, glowing eye, of pointed teeth on display in a jagged smile, and the words _see you real soon_ on repeat. It sends a shudder along his spine that is always chased by dread. Ford feels foolish, and strangely guilty, and all he wants to do is sleep his days away, until he sees Bill again. He’s even considered using the summoning ritual – truly, the act of a desperate man – but some part of him is at least wise enough to guess that such tactics would only serve to annoy Bill.

“Hiya, SMART GUY!” 

Ford’s entire body jerks in surprise, and for a moment he is sure that he’s imagined Bill’s voice piercing through his mind. But he whirls around and, against all odds, against all reason, there is the triangle, a bright yellow stain amongst the dullness of the physical world. At first, he’s just confused. He knows that he isn’t asleep. Like Bill can hear his thoughts, his muse gives a laugh, floating closer.

“I’m a FIGMENT of your WILDEST IMAGINATION, Fordsy, but that DOESN’T MEAN I’m not HERE!” The contradiction inherent in the statement makes Ford smile, even it as it sets his mind to churning. “I can’t EXIST on your PHYSICAL PLANE! I CAN, however, make a PROJECTION of myself – for YOUR convenience! Just THINK of me as your VERY OWN AUDITORY-VISUAL HALLUCINATION!”

“You can’t exist here? Why not?” The questions escape him before he has a chance to consider if they might be rude.

“We might have a CONNECTION, Sixer, but we’re still FUNDAMENTALLY from separate dimensions! It’ll take something a LOT STRONGER to let us PHYSICALLY CO-EXIST!” The glowing triangle drifts closer, and Ford feels a phantom touch as Bill makes a motion of flicking the tip of his nose. “Doesn’t need to STOP US from having a GOOD TIME, right?” 

“Something a lot stronger…?” Ford echoes, trying to ignore the flush the last question left on his cheeks. Was Bill implying that there was some way they could interact further than this, even outside of the mindscape?

“Yeah, but we can worry about that LATER! Right NOW, I wanna see what YOU’VE been up to!” Before Ford can even think about resisting him, Bill has disappeared, and the man whips around to find his muse floating over the pages of his journal, inspecting his halfhearted sketches. 

“T-They’re not finished!” Ford rushes to defend himself.

“I can see that, Fordsy.” His muse turns, and blinks his eye weirdly; strangely… forcefully? “That was a WINK!” Ford isn’t sure what to do, and then Bill pantomimes flipping through the pages of his journal, only his spectral fingers go straight through the sheets and-

Oh, right. Ford clears his throat and leans forward, shuffling backwards a few pages. Bill is floating between himself and the desk, bracketed between his arms. 

“BRILLIANT, as always, IQ, and quite PERCEPTIVE!” Bill sounds excited.

That familiar, spreading, almost buzzing warmth is in his chest, and his heart quickens and pounds. There is a large part of him that flourishes with the praise, but it is tempered as always by the nagging in the back of his mind, that he doesn’t deserve this, that it’s only a matter of time until this daydream scatters like fading light. Ford’s gaze drops to the pages, pressing a hand flat against them.

“Thank you, Bill, but this is nothing, really…” he says. He begins to leaf backwards through the pages, hyperaware of where Bill has drifted to float next to him, but he doesn’t dare look. “I still haven’t been able to identify their common origin – the only thing all these creatures seem to have in common at all is their _weirdity_.” 

His muse’s bright glow in suddenly right before him, and Ford lifts his eyes. Both of Bill’s arms are stretched out, like his hands would be cupping the sides of Ford’s face if physical touch were a possibility. The triangle is gazing at him fondly.

“It’s a TRICKY ONE, that’s for SURE, but I have ABSOLUTE faith in you, Sixer! If ANYONE can figure this out, it’s you!” Some vague tension inside him releases, and Ford finds at least a small smile again. “HEY, I’ve got a little something FOR YOU next time we’re in the MINDSCAPE! Feeling sleepy?”

Ford wasn’t before, but he closes his journal and flicks the lights off. 

Falling asleep into the mindscape is like blinking; one moment Ford is trying to force himself to lie still under his covers, calm his racing thoughts, and the next he is upright, standing in an empty field. In the distance, surrounding him on all sides are tall mountains, their peaks dry and barren and their sides obscured by dense forests. Strangely enough, he can hear what sounds like the quiet chiming of bells, ringing on unfelt winds. 

“Bill?” Ford pauses for a few moments, feeling embarrassed in a weird way, like he doesn’t know what to do with his hands. He looks around, trying to appear as if he is not actively searching for any sign of his muse. After a handful of elongated minutes, Ford decides to take his chances with exploration. 

Even without Bill’s presence, the mindscape is a wondrous thing to behold. Every sensation is realistic, to the point of being disturbing. Ford marches towards the nearest forest. His mind races with anticipation. The thrill of discovery drives him in the waking world, and he can feel its insistent tugging here. He’s sure that when Bill is ready, he will come find him.

The trees stretch up high above him, but green-tinted sunlight is still able to pierce through in sparse patches, dust and pollen drifting lazily in their golden shafts. It’s peaceful and calming, and Ford runs his hands across the rough bark of the trees as he passes. It reminds him of Gravity Falls, and as he goes he spots some of the vegetation he has documented in his journals, spots footprints of mundane and strange creatures alike beneath the undergrowth. The forest is thick and the ground is littered with gnarled roots, but there is always a clear path for him to walk along.

Gradually, the trees become sparser. The thick, dark trees with their canopies of wide leaves become fewer and fewer, and are replaced with the thin trees that Ford first encountered outside of what he now thinks of as Bill’s cavern. Their pale bark is comforting, and Ford isn’t even concerned that the strange whirls along their surfaces seem to track his movements like eyes. If anyone is watching him, it’s Bill, and the thought of his muse observing is more flattering than disturbing.

Flowers begin to encroach upon the path, with long stems that curve under the weight of their petals. Dark blue and bell-shaped – hyacinths, Ford recalls, and wonders what distant part of his mind has called them to root. They aren’t native to the forests around Gravity Falls, that’s for sure. Perhaps Bill put them there, and the idea of his muse laying out a path of flowers for him is ridiculous enough that he chuckles aloud. Ridiculous. 

_See you real soon. Static at his fingertips. Hands at his spine, pressing at his sides._ Ford shakes his head, the skin at the back of his neck prickling. The feeling of being watched intensifies, and it isn’t comforting anymore. A breeze stirs through the leaves and branches. The sound of them brushing against one another is like rustling whispers and hushed laughter. 

Bill isn’t human – what he _is_ , exactly, is hard to describe, but that is one certainty. The muse was playing with him. Or, more likely (and Ford’s cheeks, the tips of his ears burn while his stomach roils uncomfortably), Bill has no idea of the possible implications of his actions. 

Guilt and worry gnaw at him, and he tries his best to shove them both down as he traipses through the woods. The finer details of the environment are lost to him as his thoughts spiral, snapping at each other. It’s wrong to be thinking of his muse this way. He draws his hands together in front of him, staring at his matching sets of six fingers. It’s wrong. 

Ford trips over a root.

Laughter – actual laughter, high pitched, almost irritating if not for who it belonged to – has Ford looking up from where he’s sprawled on the ground. Some little piece of him expects to hear – _freak, loser_ – jeering, childhood insults, but of course no such things come from his muse. 

“Walk much, Sixer? Don’t tell me your LEGS are VESTIGIAL too!” If he didn’t know Bill so well by now, he would almost take his ribbing seriously. Instead Ford chuckles, tries to ignore the burning in his cheeks as he rights himself. Bill stretches out a hand in an offer of help. “Also, it’s a DREAM, GRAVITY is pretty much OPTIONAL!”

Their hands clasp. His eyes are fixated on Bill, watching him flash with every word. Ford clings to the distraction like a life line, tries not to think about - _tingles spreading up and down his arms, goosebumps prickling out across his skin, following Bill’s hands_ \- his newfound and wholly inappropriate diversions. Being in direct contact with his muse isn’t helping, and as he watches Bill’s eye curves like he’s in on a private joke.

Like the whole world is his private joke. Ford’s never felt so exposed; he could swear Bill knows exactly what he’s thinking, what he’s been thinking. 

The moment passes when Bill yanks him upwards, his black arm stretching and bending like taffy. Bill’s fingers are so tight around his hand that white impressions of them are left in his skin when the muse lets him go again. Ford’s unsteady on his feet for a moment but he tries to recover quickly, not wanting to disappoint his muse. His eyes drift to his hand, and he watches the pale stripes on his skin as he flexes his fingers over and over. 

“Did you do all this, Bill? It’s a bit of a departure from the usual,” Ford says. Bill drifts down to the ground, eying one of the drooping flowers. He flicks one of the blue petal bells and then his stick arms move up and down his sides in a weird shrugging motion. 

“Don’t look at ME! This is YOUR mindscape after all!” The flower he flicked is losing all its petals, the stem turning black and curling in on itself. Ford barely notices, too busy flushing. Of course, this is all his mind’s doing. “Feeling more GROUNDED than USUAL, Fordsy?” Bill floats back up until he’s hovering right in front of him. Ford pales.

“W-What do you mean? Grounded?” Bill’s smiling, and it’s almost – a part of his mind is screaming _predatory, danger, run away, run far away,_ but that’s absurd - it’s Bill: his friend, his muse. Bill stares at him for another moment, and it’s impossible to read his features, but then he shrugs again.

“It’s a little less CONCEPTUAL in here, that’s all! Must be your focus on your RESEARCH! We’re in a FOREST, after all!” The triangle’s drifting around him in lazy circles now, and Ford can feel himself unwinding slightly. He latches onto Bill’s explanation. 

“That must be it,” he agrees, and Bill pauses in his movements. Ford, if pressed, would have to label his expression as a _smirk_ , but… that’s absurd. 

For a moment, Ford can imagine the colors of the world inverting, the bone white trees become sharp, dark spears that jab through his skin and gut. Black isn’t the inverse of yellow, but he can picture his muse as a throbbing black hole, his eye the burning center, consuming him. Ford blinks and the image is cleared, and Bill is still staring at him, staring at him. In the back of his mind, just over his shoulder, Ford swears he can hear laughter. 

“SO! Don’t you wanna know what it is I DID do you for?” Bill interrupts his nonsensical thoughts. Ford lets out a breath he didn’t even realize he was holding as his mind sluggishly tries to catch up. Oh, right, there was a reason he fell asleep so easily in the first place, wasn’t there? 

“O-of course I do, Bill,” Ford says. He hopes he doesn’t sound too ungrateful for everything that Bill has already given him. As soon as the words leave his mouth, Ford finds himself nauseous, the world heaving beneath his feet. He actually has to close his eyes against the swirling, pulsating actions of the outside universe. 

A pale glow illuminates the thin skin of his eyelids, the only warning that Bill has come closer before small hands are cupping his face. His palms are smooth, like warm and living glass. Ford swallows around a lump in his throat. He can feel himself leaning into the touch, and a shiver rolls down his spine when Bill moves one of his thumbs in small circles along his skin. At his sides, Ford’s fingers twitch, and he fights to stay still. 

He wants to reach out and touch Bill again, to feel his surface sparking beneath his fingers. He wants Bill to touch him, to keep touching him. Ford licks his lips, and he can hear Bill chuckle. 

“Sixer,” Bill says, and Ford can feel his heart hammering in his chest. And then his touch is gone, Ford’s eyes flying open automatically at the loss. He’s still in the woods, but it’s dark out now, and Ford recognizes the night sky. Not the one from Gravity Falls or Jersey, not the one he used to stare up at from his window at Backupsmore. His personal sky, with its stars hanging undisturbed by moon or clouds and all the brighter for it. The stars shift, subtly, when Ford isn’t looking. 

“Bill?” he asks. When he steps forward, he’s suddenly waist-deep in water, a cool placid lake that serves as a mirror of the sky above. Something swims by him, coils loosely around his legs, and Ford jerks back automatically. Whatever it was withdraws, and takes care not to touch him again, but Ford doesn’t notice. His eyes are glued to the surface of the water, which remains still and calm regardless of his thrashing. 

He pulls his hands up from the water, evoking neither a splash nor a sound from the lake. Ribbons of water trail down his hands, fat droplets of it tremble on his skin and drop down. Not a ripple, not even the tiniest hint of motion. Ford throws his hands back under, like he used to when he wanted to splash Stanley, but they just sink into the water. It looks like he’s shoving his hands into the night sky.

“Something WRONG, Sixer?” Ford startles at his muse’s voice. How had he not noticed a floating, glowing triangle approaching? Bill laughs, drifting about him in his usual circles. 

“I don’t understand,” Ford admits. One of Bill’s hands goes to his hair and ruffles it fondly.

“Oh come on, you haven’t even TRIED to understand it yet! Don’t UNDERESTIMATE yourself here, IQ!” Bill sounds so completely sure, completely confident in Ford that the encouragement actually makes him hunch, curling inwards to himself just an inch. Something has its fingers around his heart, has a fist twisting around in his stomach, at the thought of disappointing Bill. Of not being as clever as his muse believes him to be. 

There’s obviously something here. The water doesn’t move, not for him, not for whatever other creatures are stirring below its tranquil façade. Bill drifts into his sight again, smiling like he always is. 

“It’s not EASY putting a PUZZLE together without all the PIECES, huh? Talk it OUT, Sixer!” 

“The water should be reacting,” Ford says. It’s the most basic observation, step one. 

“YUP!”

“But it isn’t.”

“Doesn’t LOOK like it is, does it?” Bill comes to a stop in front of him. Waiting. Ford’s mind is shifting desperately, trying to shove something meaningful together. “I TOLD you you’re MISSING a piece of the puzzle! And it’s not JUST a PIECE – you’ve only got HALF the picture! But here’s the THING: YOU’VE got an ACE in the HOLE!” Bill takes gentle hold of his chin with one hand, guiding Ford to tear his gaze away from the water, to look at him. “We ALL need a HELPING HAND every NOW and THEN, right buddy? It’s not JUST about having all the ANSWERS – it’s about ASKING the right QUESTIONS!” 

It clicks for him. “ _Why_ isn’t the water reacting, Bill?” Bill’s eye curves upwards, and Ford feels an echoing smile on his own face, feels – elated, smart, _special_.

“’Cause you’re STANDING in the MIDDLE of it, Sixer! You want things to get _WEIRD_ , am I right? Well SOMETIMES that takes an OUTSIDE perspective!”

Letting Ford go, Bill floats away from him, down closer to the lake. And with one finger extended, he taps the surface of lake, ripples radiating outwards in waves. Ford’s trying to piece it together – weirdness, ripples, _an outside perspective_ \- but the ripples keep growing, faster and faster, turning the mirrored sky into choppy, frantic waters. He can hear things lashing below the surface now, and Bill comes back over to him, and extends a hand.

“You wanna SHAKE THINGS UP, don’t you?” Ford grabs onto Bill’s hand for the second time, and the muse yanks him out of the water effortlessly. Now when the droplets fall off of him like rain, they patter loudly against the churning lake, the ripples he produces cascading outwards, crashing into one another. His body floats in midair, hangs weightless. 

“I-I don’t know, Bill.” Does he want to shake things up? Ford isn’t so sure. But then he imagines the shock and awe of the world when he releases his findings, the esteem of his colleagues when he extrapolates his theories. The pride, the delight in Bill’s eye when things finally slide into place. Maybe shaking things up is exactly what he wants.

“Go ON, Sixer, don’t be afraid!” Ford’s floating horizontally above the lake, less than an arm’s length away from the shifting surface. “I’m right here.” 

Ford plunges his arm back into the water, and this time the lake reacts so violently it produces a splash, water drops speckling against his face, soaking into the front of his sweater. With the now constant waves, he can’t recognize the night sky as his own anymore, he can’t even recognize his own likeness, and funnily enough, the vague, smudgy outline of Bill’s reflection looks like one great, glowing eye.

The dream ends abruptly. 

Ford sits up with a groan, rubbing at his eyes. His head is pounding. It feels like he’s gone to sleep with a fever, his skin hot and clammy, a thin layer of slick sweat coating him. He throws the covers off, almost expecting his clothing to still be soaked from the lake, but of course they’re not. His mind chews over the dream with Bill endlessly as he peels his sweater off, sighing with relief at the kiss of the cool air along his chest and back. 

Kicking his legs over the side, he pauses, resting one arm on his knee and rubbing the other self-consciously along the back off his neck. Ford cringes at how damp the strands of his hair are. But it’s mostly a mindless, automatic reaction. His gaze strays to his desk and he stands, striding over to the cluttered mess. On top of various papers, toss away sketches and reference books lies his journal, and he picks up the heavy tome, laying his palm over the glossy handprint on its cover.

 _Weirdness. Ripples. And an outside perspective._ Ford smiles, and not for the first time thanks the fates that have brought he and his muse together.


	3. Once upon a dream

Crash Site Omega. It’s a two-day hike from Ford’s secluded cabin in the middle of the woods to the peak of Gravity Falls, but it’s always worth the trip. This time is no different, and Ford has filled pages of his journal with sketches and musings on the various creatures he’s discovered skulking around the isolated mountain trails or burrowing deep underground. It makes him smile to think of the quaint townsfolk, who have no idea of the strange and fascinating world that surrounds them. What will they do when Ford is finally ready to unveil his work, and they discover they are at the epicenter of the scientific world’s curiosity? 

He chuckles, and sets his bag down on the clearing. Night had fallen some time ago, but Ford had pressed on, wanting to get closer to the crash site before settling down for the evening. The stars wink dully in the sky. Ford lies on his back with his head propped up on his pack and observes them. They’re beautiful, of course – he’s always been a fan of the night sky. It used to set his mind reeling, dreaming of ungraspable things. But now it pales in comparison the one he sees so often in his mindscape.

Everything here pales in comparison. His hands stroke through the soft blades of dark grass. And since he’s met Bill, well, almost nothing seems out of his grasp. This place – Gravity Falls – has already stretched his imagined limitations of what the natural world can produce, and the introduction of Bill into his life has all but removed those boundaries entirely. 

Bill. Ford hasn’t seen his muse since the night he gifted him this latest piece of advice. It’s not surprising, really. His muse trusts him to figure things out, wants to see what Ford is capable of by himself. And Ford doesn’t plan on disappointing him. It feels almost like a challenge, one he is excited to rise to. 

Of course, he sometimes wishes that Bill would hang around longer. Or come to him more frequently. Not to give him advice, or answers – he still wants to prove himself to his muse, after all – but just for… _Just for what?_ Ford frowns, and his hands tighten into loose fists around the grass. Companionship perhaps? As elating as it is to be unhindered on his own, it does occasionally feel a bit lonely. Perhaps it’s just a side effect of being a twin.

But really, can he be blamed for wanting to spend more time with his muse? Bill is energetic, insightful, knowledgeable – the most intelligent being Ford has ever encountered. He’s patient, too, and understanding, guiding Ford through metaphysical concepts with a steady hand. They are on fundamentally different levels, and yet Ford never feels as though he is being placated or condescended to. And his muse’s genuine care and interest in him is undeniably flattering.

Not to mention the literal flattery that Bill heaps upon him. Flattery that never feels false, or insincere. Flattery that is not simply a thin veneer covering disdain or jealousy. Bill has recognized him, his abilities, his _potential_ , and refuses to hand anything to him on a platter. How could he _not_ want to spend more time with him? How could he not want-

Ford attempts to shut down his own thoughts; it’s hardly successful. It feels like Bill permeates the very air around him, and he scoffs when his mind points out a cluster of stars that could even be thought to resemble his muse. His persistence is not a trait that he would generally denigrate, but now that his mind is stubbornly stuck on following this particular train of thought to its bitter end, Ford curses himself. 

Because it must come to a bitter end. Whatever it is that he _wants_ from his muse – and the thought of putting _that_ into words has his stomach doing nauseating flip flops – is impossible, for any number of reasons. Bill’s a muse. Bill exists in his mind, or another dimension – either option is equally insurmountable. Bill is a _triangle_. He doesn’t even have a mouth most of the time! (A mistake to think about, because now he’s picturing Bill coming closer, his eye warping strangely into a mouth, soft lips brushing against his own, or worse, wrapping around his-)

Ford jerks upright, shaking his head as if he could shake his thoughts loose. His pulse is quick and bounding. This is unbelievable. He just has to think clearly. There’s no need to get worked up. Keep it to himself, cringe at his stuttering inability to get a coherent sentence out, and eventually get over it.

It’s not as though Bill would understand. Ford still isn’t able to quantify him in any meaningful ways, but his muse has time and again expressed fascination and incredulity at normal human responses. Of course, his muse has also expressed many human responses himself. Some are probably specifically emoted to give Ford some kind of reference point, but Bill must feel _something_ for him. 

Letting out a frustrated sigh, Ford stands and then crouches, beginning the task of setting up his camp for the night. The only choice he has, obviously, is to wait it out. Suppress his thoughts when he can, keep himself busy – and with a new clue to the weirdness of Gravity Falls, he can’t imagine he’ll have much time to spare for- for whatever this is. Life will move on, and one day he’ll think back on this time and be able to laugh at himself.

All of this is, naturally, easier said than done. Ford may be able to take tentative charge of his conscious thoughts, but his subconscious is much more difficult to wrangle. Predictably, this is expressed in his dreams, where he’s most vulnerable. Since Bill has been dragging his waking mind into the mindscape, Ford’s become marginally more aware of himself in his own dreams. Aware enough, at least, that he has some idea he’s asleep, and some autonomy within the dreamscape itself. 

He dreams that he and Bill are talking, and he startles in the midst of their conversation, realizing he has understood and retained none of it. Bill remains in his seat, flashing as though Ford should still be hearing his half of the conversation. It’s his night sky around them, but it’s littered with garbage – a swing set, a ship, various metallic pieces of robotics equipment spilling like entrails and loosely connected by sparking wires. Bill’s light stabilizes, and he’s looking at Ford expectantly, and even though it’s a dream – he knows it’s a dream now – he nevertheless feels embarrassed and self-conscious.

“What’s up, IQ?” Bill asks. It’s not Bill. He drifts closer anyway. “Feeling a little NOSTALGIC?”

Ford’s eyes flick briefly away from his muse, jump across the items lingering in his mind, but it’s hard to keep his gaze off of Bill as the triangle steadily invades his personal space. Bill chuckles, and cards his fingers through his hair. It’s a dream, but Ford can feel the pricks of his claws scraping along his scalp, forward and backward.

“Deep rooted INSECURITIES and CRIPPLING SELF-DOUBT got your tongue?” Bill’s eye is curved in his usual grin.

Ford rolls his eyes. Of course his imagining of his muse comes with the snarky attitude. He wonders what that says about him. He opens his mouth to respond, but before he can get a word out Bill has moved his hand, hooking his thumb over Ford’s lower lip and gently pulling his jaw open. Ford’s heart is racing, and Bill’s free hand comes over. He sticks two fingers into Ford’s mouth, and the otherworldly smooth digits stroke against his tongue. They muffle some sound – protestation, indignation, compliance? – and Ford struggles not to drool around them, his tongue automatically wriggling and pressing against the intrusion. Bill’s eye goes half lidded and his fingers curl and relax and curl, petting Ford’s tongue.

“Hmm, I don’t SEE anything!” his dream-muse says, and then Ford’s tongue is trapped between Bill’s fingers and thumb, and Bill tugs on it insistently, until Ford’s mouth is open and slack with his tongue hanging out. Bill’s gaze meets his own and Ford makes some noise, some sound that makes his cheeks burn with shame. He squirms in his seat. “You don’t look very COMFORTABLE there, Sixer! Why don’t you make yourself at HOME?”

And suddenly Ford isn’t seated anymore, is on his knees instead, and those fingers are still holding his tongue captive but now saliva is welling up behind his bottom lip and dripping over the edge, down his chin. Every part of his body feels flushed, feels pulsating, and he rubs his thighs together, takes a deep and shuddering breath. He tries to pull his tongue back in his mouth but the organ just squirms ineffectively in Bill’s grasp. His muse gives it a tug and he groans.

“WOW, you just do this stuff all on your OWN, huh _genius_?” Ford frowns, confused, and Bill comes in closer. “THIS is what you want?” So what if it is? It’s his dream, his private thoughts. Bill laughs, and this time it’s cruel somehow, makes Ford feel uneasy, even as he knows he’s facing nothing more than his own mind. But his muse lets go of him – and he doesn’t whimper at the loss, in the back of his throat – and then both of those saliva slick hands are tangling in his hair.

Bill’s close enough to him that Ford can feel his eyelashes tickling over his face each time the muse blinks. There’s one more last flick of them across his skin and then Bill’s flipped over to his mouth. His lips brush over Ford’s once, twice, and Ford can feel himself trembling, aching to drive forward. They’re smooth and soft, and every point of contact tingles like electricity. And then the hands in his hair tighten and drag him forward, and Bill’s mouth meets his firmly.

Their mouths move in tandem, and Bill’s tongue licks against his lips and then moves further inside him. Everything is slick and hot, and Ford lets slip a moan that’s drowned between them. His hands finally move, coming up to press against Bill’s back plane, curling his fingers so that they dig in and press at the grooves between Bill’s bricks. How, how any of this can feel as good as it does – doesn’t make any sense. Bill’s tongue is long and prehensile, beyond any human’s, and it twines around his own. Ford’s eyes snap open when it plunges down his throat briefly before his muse is drawing away from him entirely.

Ford wants to follow but black, sticky ropes are winding around his arms, his legs, his chest, his neck. They drag him backwards, and he only seems to become more firmly ensnared as he thrashes, desperate to break free.

“Bill!” he calls out for help. His muse startles like he hadn’t noticed anything was amiss.

“What’s the MATTER, Fordsy? This is just a DREAM, after all,” Bill says. Ford can feel panic welling up, beating frantically against his chest like a caged, wounded bird. He’s being dragged away from his muse, down into some deep, dark infinity, and there’s nothing he can do to stop it, no way to break free from-

“I can tell, you and I are going to have FUN!” 

Ford jolts awake. His heart is pounding. He feels like he can’t get enough breath, his lungs heaving with short, quick pants. His chest feels constricted and he struggles to a sitting position, hunching over. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he realizes a sound awoke him – a sound that must have come from him, and ridiculously, Ford is thankful that Stanley isn’t here. He’d never hear the end of it from his twin if he woke himself out of his own…

Nightmare? 

Even now, he isn’t sure. Some base panic has him firmly in its grip, twisting him around, wringing him out, but it’s already ebbing away. Staring blankly ahead, his fingers trace over his own lips, and he imagines he can feel every loop and whirl on their surface, the calluses formed from traipsing through woods and crafting new inventions. Nothing like Bill’s.

A shiver of dread, and then it feels like lightning strikes his body, heat pooling in his groin. He remembers the (imagined) sensation of kneeling, the slight discomfort in the joints of his knees, thin skin caught between his bones and the floor. Bill’s hands on him, soft and smooth and leaving his flesh tingling behind them. His lips against him, his tongue inside him, inspiring more currents to flood through his body, like he was being scalded by raw energy.

But it wasn’t real. It’s so vivid, even now – if he closes his eyes, he can practically see the images playing across his eyelids. He still feels electrified, regardless of the knowledge that it was all a dream. A figment of his wildest imaginations, as Bill would say. His cheeks feel hot, he’s sure he’s turning red, and he fights the urge to touch himself in any way, pressing his hands instead into the crinkling fabric of his sleeping bag.

Ford collapses back into his bedding, his body stiff and rigid. His fingers are twitching at his sides again while he stares blankly at the taunt fabric of the tent above him. Embarrassment and worry curdle in his insides. The rushing tide of adrenal he’d awoken with slips away in slow increments, leaving his skin feeling strangely cold. His thoughts are still tangled up in Bill when he drifts back to sleep, but he doesn’t dream again. 

In Ford’s experience, problems always seem less intimidating in the bright rays of daylight. He wakes a handful of short, peaceful hours later that seem to pass by in seconds. Pink dawn illuminates the tent, giving everything a soft and almost blurry feel, and he feels completely relaxed. Barely remembers waking up in a panic, and Ford has a moment where he even wonders what he could have felt so anxious about before. 

And then his dream comes back to him in bits and pieces, and Ford has to turn to hide his face in his pillow, groaning. He can only remember small chunks of it – Bill’s fingers in his mouth, Bill’s lips against his, Bill’s tongue in his _throat_ \- but it’s more than enough to send that bolt of heat lancing through him like an encore performance. Indulging this isn’t healthy, but Ford can’t deny himself the opportunity to go over every detail in his head, the imagined sensations of Bill’s hands tangling in his hair. He bites his lower lip, and can envision the dull, blunt pain as inflicted by someone – something – else.

This is… not good. The final nail in the coffin of whatever deniability he may have held. Ford tries not to brood, but his mind is impossible to stop. The more he turns it over in his thoughts, the more his stomach ties itself into knots. This is his _muse_ he’s thinking about. This strange, physical fixation feels like it’s sullying their partnership already, degrading it. Bill is so much more to him than-

Ford can’t even put it into words. He feels almost lost, and there’s a painful twitch in his chest when he realizes that his first instinct is to ask Bill what to do. Bill, who will probably be disgusted with him. All it took was what, a few extra hands, for Ford’s mind to completely warp their relationship? It still sends a shiver through his body when he thinks about it. 

Frustrated, he clenches his fists, so tight he can feel his fingernails biting the flesh of his palm - and it feels like a reassurance of what he already knows. 

Five crescents. 

_Freak. Unnatural._

What would Bill say?

Still feeling vaguely sick, Ford drags himself upright. There’s no point in dwelling on his dreams now, at the least. If he throws himself into his work, it will fade away. There is plenty here to entertain him, after all - literal feet away from a crashed alien spaceship. 

He forces himself to focus. The last dream he had with Bill – the real Bill, not the tawdry impersonation his own cognizance created – has led him here. And the possibility is tantalizing: the epicenter of the ripples of weirdness invading Gravity Falls. Assuming he has understood his muse correctly, if nothing in his dimension can cause the strange happenings plaguing the town and woods, then it must be the result of an outside force - perhaps some sort of weirdness-residue spreading its influence, creeping into his reality like a malignancy. 

And the most outside thing Ford has encountered is buried in a shallow grave just under his feet.

The sun was only barely beginning to climb its way above the treetops when Ford awoke, but it’s fully in view by the time he has packed his belongings and is ready to venture into the depths of the ship. He grunts as he drops his pack near the heavy rock he uses to obscure the entrance. It’s been months since he was last here. An uneasiness lingers in the back of his mind somewhere – has been coiling there all morning – but it’s easy to brush off. There’s nothing alive down there. 

With no small amount of effort, he heaves the boulder aside. The latch looks innocuous; well, as innocuous as the door to an alien spacecraft can look, he supposes. The magnet gun hums in his hand and then the latch is flinging open, falling on its side with a dull thud. There’s a vague reverberation as it clangs against the grass-covered husk of the ship. 

Staring down the dark tunnel reminds him of something. In his dream? He frowns, and remembers sticky blackness, coiling and intrusive around his limbs. A cold shudder rolls down his spine. Preposterous, of course. A nightmare. His mind probably trying to rid itself of – _hands pressing all around him, fingers in his mouth_ – foolish trivialities. More forcibly than is entirely necessary, Ford rips his flare open, bright crackling sparks sizzling off its end. He drops it down the shaft and follows behind.

The flare, predictably, reaches the floor level long before Ford does, and he is left in a chill and creaking silence that is only interrupted by the thudding of his boots on each rung of the ladder. Diving into his work has always been an escape. Misunderstandings, arguments – Ford finds it gratifying to set emotional issues aside for a time, to consider them in detail at his leisure. And with a mind like his, the only way he can shove a puzzle to its rightful corner is to distract himself with another.

Thankfully, Bill presents him with nothing short of an endless list of puzzles.


	4. I can see the beauty in the mess

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long wait!

“You should’ve SEEN this ‘pyramid,’ IQ – talk about YUCK! It was like the guy had never even HEARD of an EQUILATERAL triangle, let ALONE spoke to one NIGHTLY basis! And- HEY!” Dark fingers snap just before his face, close enough that the tip of Ford’s nose is flicked during the action. Ford himself snaps out of his daze and jerks his head back. “ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME?”

The truth is unpalatable; no, Ford has not been listening. The man flushes and shifts in his seat, clears his throat while his mind races for excuses, for answers, for anything other than the high pitched, blank whine that sounds eerily like the heart monitor of a patient flat-lining. He shakes his head and the sound is cleared, but Bill is still hovering in front of him, arms crossed over his front, eye scrunched with annoyance.

“Uhhh….” So far so smooth. Ford sighs. “No, Bill. I wasn’t. I’m-” 

A frustrated sound from Bill cuts him off, his muse throwing his arms in the air. “What is WRONG with you lately, huh? You’ve been doing this whole SPACE-OUT-and-IGNORE-my-MUSE thing a LOT!” The glowing triangle begins to circle around him, inspecting him.

“I-I’ve just been distracted,” Ford says, voice croaking and heart pounding in his chest. Pounding so hard it might crack his ribcage, but his more immediate fear is the idea that he has finally pushed his luck too far; his muse is going to abandon him here and now. Bill is seeing how unworthy Ford is to be his chosen with every loop around him – can probably see it written in his disheveled hair and the bags beneath his eyes, in the hunched slope of his neck as he slouches forward.

“‘Distracted,’ he says,” Bill echoes with an eye roll. He comes to a stop in front of him, and then smooth black fingers touch the tip of Ford’s chin and guide him to straighten and look upwards again. Ford follows, though his eyes remain downcast and lost in the hidden arms of shimmering constellations. “WELL! I can BELIEVE that! But what’s that GOOPY little BRAIN of yours all WRAPPED UP around?”

Ford’s eyes flick up, looking at his muse almost guiltily. _You_ is the only answer to Bill’s question, and Ford’s mouth feels dry even to think about saying it aloud. His dreams – his _personal_ dreams, the ones he doesn’t share with anyone – have been plagued, utterly dominated by thoughts of his muse. The first - _kneeling with a trapped tongue, mouths sliding together while damp fingers tangle in his hair to drag him close_ \- seems to have sprung some spigot within him, unleashed a torrent of suppressed longing that bleeds into his every waking thought, that make him almost fearful to sleep at night. 

His worst fear is that these idle fantasies will begin to bleed into _this_ place, the mindscape he openly shares with his muse. Bill is still staring at him, no longer glaring but eye wide and blank, pupil shivering back and forth in tiny and precise twitches. It’s an odd expression, and it takes Ford a moment to realize that the muse’s strange mannerisms are because Ford has placed his _hands_ on Bill’s back plane, and his fingers are already running along the shallow, even crevices between each brick, like he’s done this a thousand times.

Well, in a way he has – in his own mind.

Letting out the most dignified yelp of surprise he can muster, Ford spasms in his armchair, hands moving to fly off the triangle’s warm surface. They’re only an inch away from the glowing gold before a pair of smaller hands are pressing them back down, sharp pin-prick claws scratching puffy red lines across his skin. Bill has four arms now, identical in every detail save for one – his newest set is on backwards, the matte black color of them making it look like an optical illusion, the way they bend the wrong way to hold Ford’s hands flat.

“Bill! I-I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to-”

“You SURE know your way around an ANGLE, huh?” Bill says, his expression softening, eyelid drooping. Ford can hear his own thought process grind to a halt.

“W-What?” Every muscle in Ford’s body is tense and bunched, trembling in minute waves. Any movement might break this moment, cause the avalanche of disappointment he _knows_ is coming to tumble. Bill lets out a chuckle and the claws of one dark hand trace delicately down the side of his face. 

“Fordsy, have you been holding out on me?” 

“I-I don’t know what you mean, Bill.” His whole face feels hot, the tips of his ears burning. Panic is still thrashing in his gut like a wild animal, and he wants to curl in a ball and hide himself away from the all seeing eye, but he stares, wide-eyed and dumb, because this isn’t what he was expecting. He was expecting Bill to laugh at him, to mock him, to throw him out and wish him well in his endeavors, because he was _never_ coming back.

Instead Bill meets his gaze, and the pads of small, soft fingers trace over his lips. Ford shudders.

“Is there something I don’t know?” Bill asks, and he’s so close the small synapse between them feels alive and sparking with heated potential. “Something you’re keeping from me, smart guy?” 

Those fingers follow the dip of his bottom lip and then the bow of his upper, slow, again and again, and each pass sends delicate tingles through his body, to the tips of his feet, to his fingers, to his stomach that feels fluttering. Ford presses his hands harder against Bill. 

“I have been keeping something from you,” he admits, surprised and embarrassed when his voice comes out a throaty whisper. The words on his tongue make him dizzy – or maybe it’s just the feeling of his lips brushing back along the warm skin of the black fingers still hovering over them. “Bill, I-”

 _Can’t stop thinking about you._ His eyes creak open and Ford’s waking urge is to throw his pillow across the room in frustration. 

Another dream. 

Bill radiates heat. In most circumstances it’s a pleasant sensation, an almost buzzing warmth that settles on his head or shoulder and sends little prickles shivering out from their point of contact like cracks spreading across an otherwise unblemished plane of glass. In other circumstances it feels smothering, hangs wet and heavy across him while making him aware of the awkwardness of his own limbs, the sudden dryness of his mouth.

“You’ve been quiet lately, Sixer.” And mouths open in the sky and lick at him. “Primitive notion of fiat currency for your thoughts?” 

“I’m dreaming,” Ford says, and it comes out stern until a tongue has parted the bottom button of his shirt and is lapping, wet and warm, directly up his flesh. When his hands rush to pull it away, mouths bite at his wrists and forearms to keep him still.

“Yup!” Bill’s drinking tea. “Is that a problem?”

“It’s getting to be-”

“Tired? Redundant? Clichéd?” Bill stretches out his arm, and with a casual twist of his wrist, is pouring his tea over Ford’s head. The man scrunches up his face as thin rivulets of the liquid dribble down his forehead.

“All of the above?” His arms are still held captive, teeth applying a pressure that stays shy of breaking but Ford can swear he feels a tension behind them, a bear trap quivering in readiness to snap. 

“Well whose fault is that? Not MINE!” Bill lets go of the teacup, but it remains in its tilted position, still spilling out a tea that had been glossy brown but now, when Ford catches glimpses of it, looks like a dark night sky thick with clustered stars. 

“I know whose fault it is,” he says. He laments, more like; this is crumbling around him in a way he’s never been equipped to deal with in the first place. 

“How about we try a THOUGHT EXPERIMENT?” Ford’s getting absolutely drenched and the mouths are chewing at his sleeves, gnawing on him. Two dark hands land on either side of his face, and their fingers crook to press at the line of his jaw, at its hinge, at the far end of his cheek bones. “What would _I_ do if _I_ were here?” 

Ford licks his lips, catching tea that tastes biting cold and seems to lash him with electricity. Fat globules of the tea hang in the air around them, suspended on invisible strings. Black speckled with shining things, they seem to bracket Bill as though they were under the pull of some cosmic sway, tiny fluctuating universes floating in lazy tandem. He swallows, and squirms under the wriggling ministration of mouths across his body. 

“You would leave.”

“BZZZT!” A huge red X replaces Bill’s pupil. The brash light refracts off the bubbles of tea around them, reflecting in a kaleidoscopic and garish array. “Try again, IQ, and this time actually, you know, TRY!”

“You would be disgusted. Disappointed.”

“BZZZT!” Red X.

“You would mock me.”

“That hurts, Sixer.”

Ford scoffs. “You’re not real.” 

“And YOU’RE projecting!” Bill brushes Ford’s wet bangs away from his face. “But you’re right – I would mock you. A little.” And then drifts closer. “But that’s not all I’d do.” And then drifts closer. And then-

Another _dream._

Or by now, perhaps they should be classified as nightmares. Not for the first time, and certainly not for the last, Ford berates himself as pathetic as he drags himself to a sitting position. His body is slick enough with sweat that he feels a chill when he tosses his sheets off. It's driving him crazy; these dreams haunt him on a near nightly basis, leaving him aching in the morning and desperate to expunge this obsession from himself. As if he could debride himself from the inside out and flush out whatever strange element has built up inside him, has turned his muse into an object of fantasy. 

It doesn’t help that his current research has been utterly fruitless. So far his efforts have turned up, to be precise: _zip, nada,_ and _nothing_. If there is some common source to the weirdness of Gravity Falls, he’s been unable to find it – and Bill has remained relentless and vague on the matter.

_”No LUCK in the SPACE SHIP, huh Fordsy?” The triangle had appeared while Ford, still unshowered and exhausted, lay flopped in his arm chair, a practical treasure trove of scientific wonderments wrenched from the bowels of the ship at his side._

_“I found a cryogenics lab,” was his mumbled reply. Bill’s eye widened and he zoomed down to the pile, flickering back and forth over top of it to view it from all angles._

_“So you did!” Ford cracked open his eyes and Bill was floating in front of him. Ford was barely able to spare a thought on how anything could look so excited just floating in the air. “Wanna know how it WORKS?”_

_Even with all his muscles tight and tender, his stomach hollow from the unplanned extension to his trip, a burning in his eyes that begged him to sleep for the next day or two, Ford perked up. Fatigue whittled at his bones, disappointment laid across him like a heavy living thing, but he sat up just a bit straighter._

_“Would you tell me?”_

_“Well, under NORMAL circumstances I WOULDN’T; but FOR YOU I can make an exception or two!” His cane materialized in his hand, and he mimed tapping Ford on the forehead with it. “Now UP! And grab that WHRILIGIG down there – hey, don’t look at me like THAT, I didn’t name it!”_

And every avenue Ford has followed since has yielded the same results. His muse has turned up, frequent as an unpredictable sun, and most nights Ford can even hold himself together enough that nothing seems amiss. Even with this _issue_ he’s been dealing with, being around Bill is, easy. Fun. Exciting. Interesting. He never feels more alive than when he wakes from one of their meandering conversations, like all the synapses in his brain are firing at once, like the possibilities before him truly are endless, like he could just reach out and grasp his wildest ambitions. 

If, sometimes, he flinches away from one of Bill’s casually, overly-friendly touches, well, that’s not the worst thing in the universe (except for the way Bill stares at him afterwards, looking like he was snared somewhere between suspicion and wonderment). Or if he sometimes finds himself without words, or his mind wandering, or his dreams constantly revolving around one particular being. It’s manageable, Ford tells himself.

Manageable.

Somehow, this has all gotten tied together with his search for this leaky faucet of strange-ity. Logically he knows that figuring out the puzzle Bill has set so graciously before him won’t end the purgatory he’s designed for himself – in his moments of clarity, he is even able to admit that solving it and earning his muse’s praise could, in fact, only worsen whatever illness has taken hold of him. But try as he might, he can’t shake the association, so even as he sketches new findings, new mysteries and weirdness, a desperation has been settling deep into his core.

Ford has felt himself winding tighter and tighter over the recent weeks, pulled taut both by his work and his private obsession (scoff here, because _obsession_ is hardly the right word for it), and his only form of release somehow, inexplicably, is the very same entity that has caused both of his other sources of stress. Maddening, at times. But as much as it galls him to admit it, science is filled with many more losses than wins, and both serve as opportunities. 

However, in the scheme of the past month and a half, Ford is in slightly better spirits today, even accounting for the ceaseless dreaming. Because today, he has come up with a new place to search. 

The cavern looms before him, a pitch black hole in the bright daylight, looking darker still by the bone white trees that flank its sides. It may have been ominous if not for the fact that Ford already knows precisely what was inside. _Don’t judge a book by its cover._ Nothing terrible has ever dwelled within this cave. He places his hand on the rough bark of one of those slim trees, and he traces his fingers along the rough and gnarled whirls disrupting its surface. 

The trees are interlocked in his mind with Bill, with the confusing rush of their first meeting, and all the rushes that came to follow it. His fingers pause. The bark is coarse beneath his fingertips, and cool to the touch. Not like Bill at all, who is smooth heat and sharp, keen edges. Being here alone is enough to cause his heart to quicken ever so slightly, to inspire the tickling sensation along the back of his neck that he knows is only his own mind’s doing; Bill isn’t around to be watching him, and Ford tries not to give a name to the sinking feeling that admission inspires in him.

He pulls his hand away from the tree and ventures closer to the cave, lighting the lantern he’d bought solely for this purpose. Daylight can only illuminate so much within the cavern – a short few feet before the shadows begin to creep further and further in – and Bill’s section of the hollow is far beyond that point. Ford marches in fearlessly. It must have been months since he last visited this place but the pathway to Bill’s carving is entrenched in his mind. He’s always been gifted with navigation.

And it helps that the cavern is a single path, winding arduously down into the ground but never splintering or branching out.

Ford still isn’t sure what he’s looking for - _you’ll know it when you see it, smart guy_ was the helpful answer Bill had finally been coerced into providing him, and that was only after Ford had spent almost a week camping and mapping out the geographical center of the woods. _Also, you maaay be taking things a touch too literally, but what do I know? Oh that’s right – everything! I know everything!_

The darkness crowds around him, pressing in almost like a physical force, threatening to swallow the tiny flare of light he holds aloft. It is utterly still inside in the cave and the air smells stiff and stale, a room whose door has stayed locked for too long. There are no sounds aside from his own muffled footsteps, not even accompanied by the hollow backtalk of an echo. It’s hard to keep track of time down here, but it’s either a lifetime or a minute later that the tunnel widens out into the yawning dead end wherein lies the effigy that changed his life. 

He walks over to it first, the crude rendition of his muse scrawled across the red clay earth and surrounded by prostrate forms. Bill Cipher. Did he go by that even then, or does his name change to remain a pun in every language? Knowing his sense of humor, the answer is probably the latter. Ford’s stomach twists a bit – does he not even know his muse’s true name? 

Ford reaches his hand out, but stops short of the mural, fingertips hovering just shy of the ancient markings. Even if he never intends on leading anyone else here, even if he has already documented these paintings in detail, he can’t deny the historical significance of this place in regards to the aboriginals that once inhabited the strange woods of Gravity Falls. Even if some part of him wants to see the yellow outline surrounding Bill’s form smeared across his fingers, even if some part of him wants to smudge a thick black line across the shakily written incantation that roused Bill from ancient memory.

Sighing, Ford drops his arm to his dangle limp at his side, and then drops to the ground in a heavy plop. He shuffles around so his back is pressed against the stone wall, well below the inscriptions. He sets the lantern on the loose dirt floor and the enormity of what he is doing and searching for crashes in like a clumsy bird of prey. What is he even doing down here, what is he looking for? Disgruntled, Ford kicks a booted foot against the ground, sending up a spray of old dirt and a fine cloud of dust to hang in the torchlight.

His mind wanders as he stares off into the dark. Dark that reminds him of the pitch black of Bill’s limbs, a shade so thick and absorbing that Ford could believe all light, every color could be lost within its depths. Which reminds him of those selfsame limbs splintering and bending at too many angles, to clutch at him and to envelope him, to move in rippling mirages and rest at the small of his back or tangle in his hair. Reminds him of thin black fingers clasped around his hand, warm and silkily smooth, yanking him off the ground or pulling him free from riotous waters. He remembers _see you real soon_ and _an outsider’s perspective_ and from his own yearnings, _why don’t you do something_ and his chest burns and aches in the empty cavern.

He thumps the back of his head against the rock wall behind him and hears ringing in his mind _but that’s not all I’d do_. His fingers clench in the dirt and gather up fistfuls of grainy earth in each hand. It shifts between his fingers like sand and he lifts one hand and watches a small, steady stream of it flow out from his clenched fist. _What am I doing here?_ he wonders, and then out of the corner of his eye, he spots a golden glint amongst the plain brown backdrop.

At first he is content to write it off as a trick of his mind, as the light from his lantern bouncing odd off a rock with sharp and crisp edges. But Ford focuses on it, and staring, the glint doesn’t fade out or diminish in any way. He leaves the lantern where it rests and shifts forwards, until he is running a hand across smooth and forgotten gold. Again and again, he cards his fingers through dirt and over the strange projection. It doesn’t scatter into the foggy fragments of dreams and slowly Ford becomes more and more excited.

It’s hard to make out what this tip of it represents, but Ford digs with bare hands in the raw earth, carving deep gouges into the cavern’s floor. Without knowing the full shape of the object, there is no way of saying where or how to dig, but Ford presses on, heedless of the grime accumulating under his fingernails, almost frenzied by the fervor he brings to his actions.

His mind races with the possibilities – what could it be? This must be _something_ \- Bill said he would know it when he saw it, didn’t he? Slowly he excavates, revealing flames, perhaps? A hand, grasping a scroll, a dull and finely cut gem, and arms leading to a familiar sloping side that brings him to an abrupt halt. Ford leans back, loose mounds of dirt packed together in careless piles all around him. 

A statue of Bill. Well, perhaps he shouldn’t be so surprised, considering the apparent nature of the cave, but why would it be buried here? Why have they warned so heavily against summoning Bill? Ford could admit that his muse was strange but Bill has as yet displayed nothing except the most gentlemanly manner. And a surprising sense of humor to boot. 

“Whatcha UP TO, IQ?” Ford jolts, startled out of his thoughts by his muse’s piercing voice and impeccable timing. Bill’s projection dips down and Ford watches his small black fingers phase through one of the piles he’s made. “Digging in the DIRT! A little OLD FASHIONED, don’t you think?”

“Bill!” Ford brushes his hands against his jeans. It hadn’t really bothered him before, but Ford notices now, of all times, how sweaty he has gotten, how much dirt is really covering his hands and clothes, is probably strewn throughout his hair or swiped across his face. “I, uh, yes. I was digging.”

Bill bursts into laughter. “You guys have SHOVELS now, right? Or did I DREAM UP that little bit of human INGENUITY! Cause if SO, BOY do I have a SURPRISE for you! It might LITERALLY blow your mind!”

“I know what shovels are, Bill,” Ford deadpans, which only causes Bill to launch into another fit of laughter. He adjusts his glasses, feeling silly. 

“Awww, hey, come on Sixer, don’t get all WEIRD on me,” Bill says. His muse floats closer, and even without touch Ford can feel the phantom sensations of his warm hands across his skin. “Or better YET – DO! I like weird!” 

_I like weird._ It isn’t a phrase that Ford would have expected to find comforting, but something eases in his chest. Of course, Bill is only saying this because he doesn’t know _how_ weird Ford is. 

“So, you decided to spend some time scooping up DIRT in the dark, huh?” Bill continues, drifting away to survey the underground chamber. He comes to a pause before his own mural. “Nice ARTWORK down here!” 

“I was looking for the epicenter of weirdness,” Ford says. Bill’s bricks reverse as he flips back around, his expression oddly blank.

“And? Did you FIND it?” 

Ford sighs. “No. There’s- no.” A large part of him wants to admit that he has no idea what he’s doing, what he’s looking for – that he’s exhausted every angle he can think of, that this was the last idea he’d been able to come up with. Ford clenches his jaw tight and says nothing. 

“Huh. Too bad!” Bill’s projection drops to sit on his shoulder and Ford straightens his posture. “And what made you wanna look around in a PLACE like THIS?”

“You, Bill, to be honest,” Ford says. “You might be the single strangest creature I’ve yet to encounter in these woods. It seemed to make sense that the highest concentration of weirdness would serve as the catalyst for the rest.”

“Hmmm.” Out of the corner of his eye, Ford can make out Bill scrunching up in his eye in thought. Then Bill hops off his shoulder, expanding slightly in size as he moves to hover before him again. “Not a bad THOUGHT there, Fordsy – not bad at all!” 

“Yes, well, obviously not a correct thought, either.” 

“Well I’M suitably impressed – you’re MUCH closer than you THINK, Sixer!” Ford’s immediate answer is to scoff, but then Bill’s words seem to process and he freezes, staring wide-eyed at his muse.

“I-I’m close?” 

“Yup! You’re CERTAINLY on the right TRACK, just not looking at it from the right VIEWPOINT yet!” 

It feels like his brain might overclock itself – he was _right_! Maybe he hasn’t slotted it all together correctly yet, but he has the pieces, at last. Something about this place, maybe the incantations? Some kind of carryover from the ancient rituals practiced here so long ago? 

“Aww, there’s the brainiac I KNOW and LOVE!” They both pause. “Uh, you know what I mean! No more DOOM and GLOOM, right?” 

“Was I that obvious?” His heart is hammering in his chest, and Ford hopes that that, at least, isn’t obvious. 

“I can read you like a geometry text book, Sixer!” Ford tries not to panic as Bill drifts just a few inches closer. “Not that I NEED to – I mean, it’s not like you’re KEEPING anything from me!” Bill fixes him with an apprising stare and Ford might be a statue with how ramrod straight he sits.

“N-No! I mean, yes, I- no, I’m not keeping anything-” The words get caught in his throat when Bill comes even nearer, and Ford swears he can feel the heat Bill gives off in the mindscape cascading over his face. He swallows and manages to clear the lump. “From you.” 

Bill stays where he is, so close. Ford digs his hands in the dirt, remembering his dreams, Bill’s shocked expression, his fingernails scraping lightly over shallow interstices. He almost, almost expects Bill to call him out on his bluff. _Obvious_. His breathing seems to have stuttered as well, holding his breath deep in his chest like a pregnant pause, awaiting disaster. And then Bill just shrugs and moves away again.

“That’s what I thought!” 

All the air rushes out of him in one heavy sigh, tension draining so suddenly that he resembles a wooden puppet with its strings cut for a moment as he recovers, shoulders slumping and limbs limp while his heart still _thumpthumpthumpthumpthumps_ a quick staccato beat below his ribs. When he looks up again, Bill is hovering over his hand-dug hole with his back plane to him.

“So THIS is what you were so invested in digging up, huh?” His glowing form drops a little lower to the ground. “Well I can’t say I BLAME you – humans sure don’t show devotion like they USED TO!” 

“Devotion?” The word sticks to his insides like thick sap. 

“Yeah, they SOMEHOW got it into their MAMMALIAN, JELLY-BASED BRAINS that I was some kind of GOD! Seemed like it would be RUDE to correct them!” Bill settles lightly on the floor and makes a movement as though he was kicking a tiny spray of dirt back into its proper place, but of course nothing in Ford’s dimension moves. “It WAS kind of cute, anyway.” 

“Why did they bury it here?” Ford asks. Bill levitates back into the air and shrugs. 

“Oh, you know how HUMANS are as well I do, Fordsy; once you OUTLIVE your USEFULNESS, they THROW YOU AWAY like yesterday’s bad news!” Bill doesn’t sound too upset by the topic, but unbidden, Ford is thinking of his father and classmates. Of Stan. “ESPECIALLY when you’re WEIRD!” 

“I like weird,” Ford echoes, and he glances at Bill a moment before dropping his gaze to the still half buried sculpture. “That is to say, you like weird – so do I.”

“I KNOW you do, no worries over here!” Bill is in his face in an instant, a weird tingling, prickling sensation across his scalp as Bill mimics ruffling his hair. “You and me til the END, right pal?” 

Ford grins up at him. “That’s right.” Whatever that end may be.

“Hey, how about a little REWARD for getting so close to cracking my PUZZLE! One last HINT!” Bill circles around him.

“Oh – right now?” 

“Nah, just the next time you’re in the MINDSCAPE – no hurry! Until then, REMEMBER: the FABRIC of REALITY is only as THIN as you BELIEVE it is!” Bill tips his hat and with a bright flare of light that leaves spots swimming across Ford’s vision, he is gone. 

Even awake, their meetings have a surrealistic edge to them, fuzzy at all the corners and as Ford sits alone in the cool, dark cave he almost has a moment to wonder if any of it had ever been real at all. He waits a moment or two, and then once he is sure Bill is gone for good for the day, Ford shuffles back over to the statue and continues digging. 

When he finally leaves the cavern, the sky is a smeared painting of pinks and golds, the rich colors seeping down from among the clouds to cast their hue dully against the bone white trees. When he gets back to his cabin, he’s almost panting with exertion, arms aching from having carried solid gold through the woods. When he collapses boneless on his couch, it is only for a minute of rest, and then he is running a wet cloth across the statue, over and over again, until its pristine form is clean and gleaming once more and he can see shimmery reflections glistening in the gem’s facets.

When he goes to sleep, the statue sits on his desk across from him and glimmers in the dark. 

When he wakes in the morning and rushes over to his journal, he doesn’t notice how its pupil seems to track his every move. And when Ford, overwhelmed, writes one frantic, jubilant sentence, he doesn’t hear the howling laughter echoing just behind his ear.

_The muse has spoken!_


	5. The good thing that I have found

_Devotion._

Ford isn’t a religious man. He isn’t one to believe in superstition, in fables or the power of stories. But-

_Some kind of god._

-for some reason, those words have become lodged in his mind. Stuck to the insides of his skull like a chewed wad of gum. The kind Stan used to cram up against the underside of his desk with his thumb, winking when Ford’s unimpressed stare caught his eye. He remembers the thin shine of slick saliva on Stan’s finger, and with an unpleasant shudder, the way Stan would wipe his hand on the side of his jeans and grin at him. 

Now Bill grins at him, and nigh-indescribable blue prints are written across the sky. Unraveling in bright glowing script, numbers that shuffle themselves into endless equations and lines that connect and combine in alien, unnatural angles. Ford is slaw-jacked, eyes darting back and forth over his mindscape. It’s like trying to read another language, or a cipher – he can pick out some patterns, instances of repetition that hint at _something_ , but without a key it remains a stubborn, jumbled mess. 

“Well, Fordsy? What do you THINK? Ready to BUILD IT?” 

His wonderment drops through the bottom of his stomach, heavy as a black hole. 

“HA! Just kidding! That’s kinda putting the CORPSE before the CARRIAGE, huh?” Bill appears at his side and elbows him. “Gotta learn to crawl out of the PROVERBIAL MUD SOUP before you can GROW LUNGS and SPROUT FUR, am I right?”

“I-” _What?_ Bill, or more precisely, another Bill, pops up before his face, and squishes his cheeks together. The flickering-lightbulb flashing of his body as he speaks is almost blinding this close.

“I’m saying, let’s start with the BASICS!” This Bill lets go of him and swings like a door to the side, to clear his view. Ford’s eye is caught by the slim glint of his profile. Bill’s not quite two-dimensional, but the descriptor’s not far off. His arms and bowtie and hat are all a flat, matching black, and could they be made out of the same material? It doesn’t make sense, but concerning Bill, when has anything? 

Bill flips back to him without warning and Ford actually recoils a fraction of an inch, feeling acutely like he has been caught. It carries with it the edge of his adolescence, freezing motionless at the creak of footsteps beyond his door, heart pounding and eyes fixed through the dark on the battered door of his room, hardly even able to breathe. Bill’s eye curves. His muse splits down the center, and like a cell, two Bills are there where there had been one. This newest copy is wearing a graduation cap in place of his top hat, and carries a pointing stick instead of a cane. 

“The basics!” New Bill repeats, and floats away from him. The other two hover by his sides, both watching their copy as though they, too, are ready for a lecture. Ford finds himself smiling. 

“You are the expert, Bill,” Ford says, and the sprawling, almost labyrinthine blueprints vanish in hazy wisps of blue tinted smoke. 

“That’s RIGHT, I AM! But YOU’RE my, what’s the word?” Bill smacks the stick down in the palm of his free hand, the sharp, cracking sound of wood against flesh that sends a rolling wave of _something_ down his center, branching out along his limbs. “Student, mentee, protégé, take your PICK!” 

Each choice fills his mind with a different imagining - _Bill before him, Bill at his side, Ford on his knees_ \- and Ford isn’t sure which he prefers. He isn’t forced to decide. The smoke coalesces into a long and meandering equation, that nonetheless feels familiar in some distant way. His eyes run across it again and again.

“Now, smart guy, what can you tell me about-”

“Gravity!” Bill drops his stick, and the two at his sides turn to stare at him. All their small, thin limbs are drooping gracelessly from the bottom of their forms. The tips of his ears turn hot, and Ford fingers along the hem of his shirt. “Uh-” clears his throat “-that _is_ what this equation, or at least part of it, refers to, correct?” 

“…You got it in ONE! Man, am I IMPRESSED! They didn’t call you Poindexter for nothing, huh?” 

Ford can feel himself beaming and he tries to reel his reaction back in. Bill has never shown any inclination to control his own emotes, but Ford’s old habits die hard and his heart is beating almost painfully in his chest. It’s even harder when a small hand shifts through his hair, scratching over his scalp in a way that sends pleasing, tingling chills shivering down his spine. 

He turns his head to the left, staring up at Bill – or the copy of his muse – still dragging his black hand up and down, back and forth, and whatever expression Ford has on his face causes his muse’s eye to crinkle upward in a smirk. Bill’s hand goes to the back of his head, and his fingers tighten around the fluffy locks of Ford’s hair, tugs gently and insistently to face him forward again. Ford swallows, hyperaware of Bill withdrawing as he turns his attention back to the equation. The other Bill is tapping his foot midair, impatient. 

“SO, now that I have your ATTENTION… GRAVITY! HOW it WORKS – which I’m SURE, a SHUT-IN NERD like YOURSELF already KNOWS ALL ABOUT – and more IMPORTANTLY, how to make it NOT WORK!” 

Ford learns what he can at night, and spends his days penning out page after page of mathematic theorems and crude, prototypical models of the machine he and Bill will build together. He writes until his hand cramps and the neat lines of his usual script become sloppy and smudged from the side of his palm. More than once he puts the wrong end of his pen up to his lips, resulting in a splattering of black ink across his mouth. 

When he closes his eyes, numbers swim incorporeally across his vision, and when he tries to go to sleep he tosses and turns while his mind runs over his work without end. Bill comes more often, both in his dreams and as the semi-hallucinatory, intangible projection that pops up in the middle of his days without warning. 

One such occurrence comes as Ford is mulling over his journal, plagued with the nagging, skittering sensation that he is forgetting something. With his thoughts occupied he doodles in the margins of his notes. A few cipher symbols, some pieces of as-yet theoretical machinery, and perhaps a scattering of triangle shapes here and there (and everywhere). Something isn’t fitting together quite right, but Ford can’t put his finger on it. He draws three lines. Did Bill say something that has managed to escape him?

“How’s it GOING?” With his usual subtlety, Bill is floating above his desk, occupying what had been previously stuffy and empty air. Ford jumps and slams his hand down flat, trying to cover up his idle sketches. It’s not very successful, as they are littered about the page, and if he looks down, heart hammering in his throat, he can see bits of them peaking between his fingers. 

“Bill! Fine! It’s uh, fine,” Ford says. 

“Let’s see what you got!” Ford can’t help but to grimace. Still, he angles his journal to let Bill get a better look. He fidgets in his seat and watches Bill’s pupil ticking back and forth across his work like a metronome. “Not BAD!” He lets out a held breath. “But you MISSED a step!” 

All the thoughts fly out of Ford’s head and he pulls his journal closer, barely aware of the way his actions drag the physical object through his muse’s projection (and the subsequent indignant yelp of said muse). He… he did. He missed a step. He can see it now, and it’s a mix of pleasure and mortification to find that his problem is so simply solved. 

Bill stays for a while and coos in his ears. _How many humans could do what you’re doing here, Fordsy? I’ve been around a long time and I know the answer – none!_ His fingers are shaking by the time he is done. And after that, he doesn’t bother to hide away his doodles. Bill never comments on them, and Ford is certain it must be his own fancies, that he imagines Bill grins a little more after he sees them. 

The dreams that fill the void between Bill’s visits are just as frustrating as ever, but now something looms constant in the periphery of his mind. Ford will dream of Bill speaking in numbers and watch the large struts and braces of some monolithic machine coming together cinch by cinch. Hands made from living darkness, their surfaces shifting and crawling as though swarms of parasites reside just below, they grab him and cradle him and aim his head towards a sky that spins in jerking, nauseating spirals.

“What is this supposed to be, anyway?” Bill – not Bill – asks him. Ford’s arms are tied behind his back, long curls of thick rope wrapped around and around each limb. When he shifts, they burn against his skin like he’s been wearing them for hours. “Student-Teacher? Muse-uh, whoever muses work with?” 

Bill places one hand on Ford’s cheek, so that the claw of his middle finger rests over the thin flesh of Ford’s lower eyelid, and tap-tap-taps against the bulging curve of his eye through it. Ford shivers, his body going tense, but he doesn’t move away. He wants to answer but a hand closes his mouth, his teeth clacking together. 

“No no, I wanna guess,” Bill says. The hand on his chin moves upward, and a cool palm rests over his lips. Bill’s finger taps against his eye. “Master-servant? Nah, not yet. Oh, I got it! Charming CON ARTIST and his lovable, DUPABLE MARK!” 

Bill shoves his claw harder against his eyelid, harder, until Ford can feel a hot bead of blood welling up. When his muse takes his hand away, it dribbles down his cheek in an unbroken stream.

“Talk about foreshadowing, am I right? Ah, what would you know anyway. Actually Fordsy, you really should count yourself lucky – ALL SEEING isn’t ALL it’s cracked up to be!” Bill laughs. Ford’s head feels stuffed full of cotton, and he thinks he must not get the joke. “Well go ahead, open up! Let’s hear those innermost thoughts and FEELINGS!” 

The hand across his mouth doesn’t move but cracks, fissures, and splits cleanly down its midline, strings of sticky black stuff stretching between the straight white bones of each half before reaching their limit and breaking. Its fingers seize and shake, and it’s only then that Ford realizes it’s got one finger too many.

“You are…” he begins, but stops. Words can’t encapsulate it. Bill narrows his eye, and Ford thinks of the statue in his den, the statues and tapestries slowly accumulating around it. Ford thinks of Bill offering him a sealed scroll, a gem, an all-seeing eye on a chain. Bill watches him, and then sprouts his extra arms, and they trail ghosting touches down his arms, across his chest, bury fingers into his hair and yank. 

“Go on, Fordsy.” Ford is dragged upwards, lifted docile into the air, and he can hear the great, groaning sound of some engine rumbling to life. The edges of his vision quake. “Go on. **GO ON.** ” The last words are preternaturally deep and resonate, and then like a laugh track spliced over itself again and again, Bill laughs and laughs and laughs.

Ford wakes up with a pounding – splitting – headache. He can only remember snatches of his dream, but he can still hear Bill whispering _go on_. His sheets stick to the sweat on his body and his pulse throbs through his veins. There is buzzing pressure inside him, building behind some dam. He clenches his fingers in the sheets and grinds his molars and wonders how long it will hold. 

Nothing has challenged him like this. It makes sense, he supposes – this is the culmination of his life’s work. It doesn’t make it any less bitter of a pill to swallow. Everything has come almost naturally to him – 12 PhDs can attest to this – and what hasn’t, has been surmounted by hard work and indomitable will. And yet, no matter how he metaphorically bashes his brains against his journals, sometimes the things Bill tells him just don’t click. 

It’s hard to say how many hours straight he has been sitting at his desk. His knees ache and the column of his spine that comes up between his shoulder blades flares rhythmically with heat. Muscles tight in broad, rock hard slabs, or bundled up like knots of tied cables. Eventually time doesn’t matter – and Ford realizes this after he sets his pen down to hunch over and rake both hands through his hair. When he looks back up, the pen is floating in midair, as are his desk and chair, and his lamp most of all, its shade titling crookedly upwards and its cord dangling behind it.

It’s not hard to guess he’s in the mindscape. There’s a warm weight on his head, and Ford doesn’t even have to catch the edge of a golden glow across the top of his line of sight to know that Bill has settled on him. Small hands fluff up his hair and then smoosh it to the sides, so Bill can lean forward and meet his eye. Ford knows what is coming.

“Fordsy,” Bill says.

“No.”

“What?” Is this really the first time he’s caught his muse off guard?

“I’m fine.” Ford stares straight ahead, at the constellations that have become a base, primal comfort. Bill laughs.

“It’s nothing to be-”

“I can do it!” he doesn’t mean to blurt it out, but he does, and his cheeks burn. The backs of his eyes prickle and he marvels at how pathetic he must be to his muse. His muse who has lived longer than human history itself, and has seen every manner of genius his species has taken. Ford shuts his eyes tight and chews on the fleshy inside of his cheek, and he feels Bill lift off his skull, and can feel the welcoming warmth that radiates from his form hovering before him.

“I know you can, IQ – I’m not doubting you here,” Bill says. Ford can’t open his eyes. “I was just thinking, maybe some ON-CALL tutoring wouldn’t be out of the question.”

“I-I don’t _need_ -”

“No, no, no one is saying NEED, Fordsy! But I have to ADMIT, this POPPING in and out of your DIMENSION thing isn’t working for me!” It twists around like a knife in his chest but Ford opens his eyes to look at his muse. “Not to say I don’t LOVE bursting in unexpected, but let’s face facts here, about HALF the time I come around you’re IN THE SHOWER!” 

“…What?” Oh god, has Bill seen him? Naked? Ford can feel his jaw hanging slack.

“Yeah! I usually just LEAVE, but not BEFORE-”

“Tutoring!” Ford interrupts, face and neck and ears all hot. “What are you proposing?” 

Bill looks upward, and taps his finger along his surface, like he’s thinking. Ford’s gaze gets caught on his claw, each time it clicks against the gold plating of his form, and his right eye aches. 

“Have you ever dabbled in MEDITATING?” 

It’s like a direct line to him, Bill promises, and the first time Ford crosses one leg over the other, he feels ridiculous. But he tries to concentrate. On the slow, deep, even in and out of his breath. His thoughts drift, but he snaps them back. Concentrates on concentrating on nothingness, at first. And then concentrates on his muse. It feels strange to allow his thoughts to linger on Bill, after he’s spent so long trying to do the exact opposite. 

Soon enough, Bill is in front of him.

“See? I’m at your BECK and CALL!” 

And so it goes. Ford will get stuck, and Bill will come whenever he beckons. He works to keep it from going to his head. From wondering what it means, how he could even begin to express it - _Bill_ , for all intents and purposes, making himself available for any question or whimsy Ford may stumble upon. He works himself ragged, until he looks in a mirror and doesn’t see himself, hollow, dark eyes and scruffy face. It’s worth it, he tells himself, and splashes water on his face. Goes to the kitchen and makes another pot of coffee, and neglects the dishes that have sat collecting in the bottom of the sink for the better part of a week that has turned into a month.

It’s worth it. 

_Devotion_ , he thinks to himself, and then thinks of the colleges that rejected him. Those faceless judges who will droop and sag to see his definitive triumph. 

But there just aren’t enough hours in the day. Sleep is simultaneously a waste and respite, and Ford feels sick to his stomach every time the telltale creep of exhaustion bleeds into his bones. He remembers feeling this way when he was young, watching the sun set on the beach with Stanley, a long summer’s day ended in equally long shades. They used to sit so close that their shadows would blur together, and Stan would talk about where they would go one day, and Ford would drift and dreamily contemplate far off shores and untold wonders. 

Far off shores – the farthest he’s ever known – are now one final mystery away. Untold wonders have already been dropped heavy into his lap, and so many more await him. He doesn’t need Stanley – he never did. This thought has blossomed, intrusively, into his mind more than once, and he doesn’t know why, but he works harder than ever. 

Ford is getting used to finding himself in the mindscape, with no recollection of going to sleep. 

“You’re burning the candle at both ends,” Bill says, right before he makes his latest offer, and his hand becomes wreathed in cerulean flames. 

_You pick the time – and the place; though I guess the place is always gonna be your fleshy meat sack, huh!_

_Just let me into your MIND, Stanford!_ And he has shaken his hand.

No matter how he has endeavored to disguise it, there is some raw and fragile part of Ford. Delicate, beefy red strings of emotion that regrow over and over. That leave him vulnerable and exposed, whenever he slips up. As he reaches his hand out, Ford is reminded of this piece of himself. _Let me in_ , Bill says, _let me in._ The blue, shivering flame feels like ice over his skin, sharp pins that dig down to his bones and make his every nerve ending tingle to life. 

Ford says, _until the end of time._

The time and the place, and what better time than now? His choice for the place is his study. Not the one where he spends his days writing, that Bill is already intimately familiar with. He chooses the one he has sequestered away, has been careful not to work in lest his muse come calling. The one that he has filled with various forgotten treasures and weavings. An altar of sorts, that he has done his best to keep obscured from its object of worship. 

The room shifts back and forth, timed with the flickering of candles strewn across its various surfaces. Ford drops to his knees and is acutely aware of the scratchy itch of his jeans. Of the force his body exerts on his knees and feet, just by resting on them. It makes him think of pressure ulcers, how they can form in just two hours of immobility, of soft, damaged, pink flesh. He lights the last two candles before him, and shifts his weight from one knee to the other and back and sighs. 

He closes his eyes, and the tiny flames of the candles morph into orange-yellow blobs across the backs of his eyelids. A deep breath in, on the count of _one, two, three, four, five_ , and a slow breath out on the count of _six, seven, eight, nine_. And again. Paying attention to the swell of his ribcage like the rising of a tide. And out. Paying attention to the ebb of his lungs, the receding waves. 

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

In.

And everything goes black.

Until he comes to again, and hears himself laughing. Ford can see, he can feel, but he can’t move, and panic thrashes wild in his stomach. His hands are moving. His right crouches like an insect around his neck, and he can feel the force of each fingertip along the column of his throat. And the left strokes up and down his stomach, beneath the bunched up layers of his shirt and vest. 

“Stanford Pines,” he hears himself say. A shudder rolls along his spine, and something clicks in his mind. _Bill._ “That’s right. And I gotta say, this is not what I was expecting!” 

Ford wishes he could swallow, he could fidget, he could pick at the fine fibers of his clothing, but there is no outlet for his nerves. His body – Bill – breathes in deep, without him. 

“I’m flattered, Fordsy.” Bill looks around the room, his eyes stopping on each and every item, and Ford feels his body reacting. His only instinct is to hide, to curl into himself, but Bill arches his back and spreads his leg, and his hand drips down like honey to caress along the length straining against the zipper of his jeans. 

Ford is a mess. He wants to hyperventilate, but Bill breathes evenly, huskily, and the thumb of his left hand flicks open his jeans. The fingers of his right hand tighten, pressing with expert precision against both carotid arteries, so he feels sick and lightheaded. Bill’s – his – left hand moves, slow at first, building to a frantic pace, and Ford finds himself unable to worry for the future. 

When it’s over, Ford is thrust back in control, pearly white droplets hanging sticky from his fingers and stomach. He stares at his hand and wonders if he imagined it all. And then he’s watching himself again, unable to even grimace as he wipes his hand off on his good sweater.

“If you wanted to take this partnership to the next level,” he hears himself say, and his head is still swimming. “You could have just said something.”

The world collapses back in on itself like a dying star, Bill’s – his – voice a slim, glowing tether in the middle of pitch black that, without sound or fanfare, blips out of existence. 

The thing about the world – or at very least, Ford’s perception of the world – blinking in and out again, is that it gives him no time to contemplate or compartmentalize anything that has happened. He jolts awake in his body, his mind still expecting the study, the candles, Bill’s hand-

Bill.

None of it is there. Lost time isn’t a concept he’s familiar with. Even if he may lose track of it, he doesn’t _lose_ it. Studying, reading, sketching – all activities that have kept up him well into the small hours of the morning and sometimes beyond. But that time isn’t gone. He knows exactly where it went, what he was doing, even if he had, perhaps, gone a little overboard in the moment. 

This is nothing like that. Fords wakes up in his living room, and the first thing that registers is a hot, painful tightness across his chest. He’s in his lounge chair, in just boxers and a thin undershirt. He looks down, hand already raised, fingers running over the white cloth, seeking out the strange irritant. His fingertips hit something damp and sticky and he frowns, wincing at the spark of pain his own touch inspires. There are random splotches where some liquid has seeped through the material of his shirt, yellowish and red tinged in some areas, all across his chest.

Ford lunges to his feet, and a book topples off his lap, landing with a soft thunk on the floor. Bewildered, he kneels down and carefully picks up the slim tome. It’s one of his journals, one of the few he hasn’t found occasion to use yet. But he turns it in his hand, and its spine is broken with tiny white hairline fractures that run up and down its length. He cracks it open, halfway expecting something to jump out at him, though he isn’t quite sure why. 

This isn’t a cheesy horror movie, so of course, nothing emerges from its pages. Instead, he just sees page after page after page of equations and diagrams, all written in a singularly precise and unknown style. _Bill,_ he thinks; this is his _muse’s_ handwriting. It only takes four or five pages for the material to become unfamiliar, but he can already begin to see how everything slots together. He’s grinning heavily, too eager with the novelty to pay close attention to the information at the moment. His flipping through is put on pause when he catches sight of a very crudely drawn stick figure in one of the corners, with the succinct note _thought I’d return the favor!_ scribbled next to it. 

He laughs, which causes the, whatever-it-is on his chest to stretch and send fresh radiating waves of irritation scrambling along his nerve roots. It spurs him to set the book on the squat coffee table and proceed towards the bathroom. Ford looks around his house like he’s never been in it before. Bill has left all the lights on, and Ford notices with a frown, the refrigerator door open. He clicks them off, one by one, and closes the door, feeling almost as though he is cleaning up after an uninvited guest. 

An unexpected breeze stirs his hair, its cool bite inspiring goosebumps to prickle out across his bare arms and legs. The chill makes a sharp contrast to the burning ache across his chest, and Ford’s not sure if it’s making things better or worse as he slams the window closed. It’s still dark outside, but he can see the faint purple and gold streaks of a sunrise on its way. 

In the bathroom, Ford leans down and splashes water across his face, and then stares at himself in the mirror. He doesn’t… look any different. But he feels different. Misplaced, somehow. His hands rest on the porcelain edge of the sink and he leans his weight forward, shoulders hunching up. He sighs and drops his hands, and then lifts his shirt off. Lets off small hisses of breath as the fabric clings to damp spots on his chest, so that he has to peel it off of himself in agonizing slow motion.

Ford frowns as he exams the marks. Raw, bright pink splotches against his skin – some blistered, some just wet and open. Small puffs of white threads from his shirt stick like burs to their edges. They’re all shallow, superficial wounds, in strange globular patterns, and it isn’t until he spots a minutely raised oval of wax that he finally puts it all together. Bill poured _candle_ wax on him. 

He swings the mirror open, snatching some antiseptic out and beginning to liberally dab it over the burns. Now that he’s able to look closer, he can see that some of them are surrounded or scoured through with thick scratches – probably Bill trying to scrap the congealed wax off his skin. Ford isn’t at all sure what to make of this. 

Curiosity is the simplest explanation. And according to someone or other’s razor, it is therefore the most likely. Ford, however, isn’t naïve; certain pictures come to mind when he thinks of hot wax dribbling down on skin, that send fresh waves of goosebumps cropping up over his body. It isn’t something he’s really given much thought to before, but apparently anything at all that involves Bill is capable of driving him to distraction.

Instinctively by this point, Ford redirects his thought process. He chides himself as inappropriate, just before he remembers what he woke into. His body kneeling in a candlelit room – a shrine – Bill speaking through his mouth, with his voice. And his hands, just the two of them, roaming over a scant section of his skin, each touch his own, familiar and yet newly electrifying. It’s still difficult to describe, even think about describing – the feeling of his body moving without his input, not quite an out of body experience. Not quite alone in his head.

Ford is quite alone now. A drop of water has been pooling quietly along the lip of the faucet, and it drips, a single syllable plop that disturbs him from his thoughts. He flicks off the light when he leaves but he leaves the door hanging open. Grabs the discarded journal from the living room and clicks the lamp once and twice and off. Descends to his study, where all the candles have burned low, become thick layered puddles with an ashy swipe of soot in their middle. 

He sits at his desk. His fingers drum, uneasy, against the book’s smooth cover. For the first time in months (he tells himself), he wonders where Stanley is. And then he opens the journal, at the beginning, and starts to read.


	6. It's always someone else's fault

“I want you to know,” Bill says, in a part of the dream Ford won’t remember. Brains, man – too easy. “There’s one big, bad truth to life, the multiverse, and everything in it, and do you have ANY idea what that is?” 

Ford shakes his head, bemused and captivated. Like he doesn’t notice that the hands Bill has cradling his cheeks have turned and begun to dig claws into the soft meat of his skin and fat til they hit teeth. 

“Everyone – and I DO mean everyone – gets EXACTLY what they deserve, Sixer,” Bill says. There’s no blood, not while Bill’s in control and most of Ford’s higher processing is taking a nap. It’s superfluous details like that that get a message all muddied up. “Wait, that’s not right; everyone gets exactly what they EARN! You – me – big dumb babies – everybody! Now isn’t that a comforting thought?” 

Eh, Ford can’t answer, can he? Dumb and mute, mute and dumb. Didn’t they mean the same thing? This isn’t really about having a conversation anyway. Bill just wants this idea to take root somewhere in the back of Ford’s mind. A beautiful, delicate flower, whose petals uncurl into a mouth that whispers in the dark.

“I want you to remember that, Fordsy! Because there’s a day coming, probably soon, but who am I? Nostradamus?” Laugh track laughter riots in, jumbled and monotonous and abruptly silent. “Okay, I helped him but I wasn’t _him_.

“What I’m saying is, things change. And when they do, you’ll probably be asking yourself something like _oohhh, what did I ever do to_ deserve _this_.” Bill sprouts an extra hand which he holds against his upper corner, charading that he’s swooning. And then it drops and clamps around the back of Ford’s head, tangles fingers in his hair and yanks him back. 

“And I just want you to **THINK** real hard about that!” 

The scene changes. Ford is on a boat. He blinks, as if startling out of a daydream, eyes blinded by the sparkling, reflective sunlight dancing on the restless water. Wind blows in heavy surges and makes waves that move across the sea in straight lines like marching soldiers. When Ford breathes in, it’s salty and brackish and clean – all the best parts of the ocean, with all the worst carefully extracted. 

His forearms are resting against the battered wooden railing bordering the stem of the ship and he straightens himself. He wonders where Bill might be. His whole body feels warm, like he has been on the prow of the boat all day. Ford smiles, an upwards tick of one edge of his lips, when he sees that his skin has been darkened to imply a life – or at least a few weeks’ time – on the sea. The waves below slap against the side of the boat, wet and quiet, rhythmic, hollow. It’s a sound he had heard only a few times in his childhood, and that he had dreamed about for many years after, even without Bill’s help.

When had he stopped dreaming about it? About this?

There are gulls crowing, too, high pitched and creaking. Ford remembers that he said they sounded sad, one day on the beach. Stan had laughed and punched his arm, and then they’d pretended to fight. They’d rolled around in the coarse sand until they were both laughing, and the thought had left his mind. Ford had spent the rest of that afternoon pasting bandaids across their raw scraped skin. A melody cuts through the haze of his nostalgia, rolling out from the cabin to his right.

“ _Dream, dream dream dream_ ,” croons out, static-y like the records Ma would put on in the living room. Ford knows the song, of course, and it makes something fluttery and nervous flare to life in his stomach. The door to the cabin swings open without a sound, and Bill steps out. Bill and not Bill, because what steps out is a human, and Ford freezes in place. 

Is he dreaming? Is this not the mindscape? This Bill – lithe and tall, blond, golden-eyed – it’s not unfamiliar. It is, in fact, a design entirely of his own conception, the result of his daydreams. Idle thoughts made flesh about how his muse might look if he were ever inclined to be less geometrical. Ford swallows, his palms sweaty and his hand clenching into fists as Bill saunters closer. The song keeps playing.

“Thought I’d change things up a bit!” Bill says, an explanation of sorts. “But you’re looking a little seasick there, Sixer!”

“Bill, I- What are you doing?” Stupid question – Bill has come to a stop just before him. Ford can feel his heart hammering in his chest as his muse reaches out a hand, but Bill only settles it on the railing behind him, effectively locking Ford in place on one side. Bill is so warm. Ford’s skin tingles where Bill’s arm brushed against it. “What is all this?” 

_How did you know?_

“I’m in your mind, Fordsy! What did you think that meant?” Bill taps a finger on Ford’s temple, a move that he uses to transition into carding through his thick dark hair. It’s all too much and Ford feels a growing urge to put distance between them, wary of the other shoe that must be waiting to drop. “No more secrets! And I have to say, this one’s a doozy, huh? I’m impressed you managed to keep it to yourself for so long!” 

Bill is too much, a figure plucked right out of his dreams. Smiling at him, leaning in to him. This isn’t something that happens to him, to people like him. What has he even been thinking, entertaining thoughts like this? Bill tugs lightly at his hair, and Ford clears his throat, awkwardly slipping his hand in the scant space between them to adjust his glasses. 

“I know we’re technically both in your head right now, but do you mind getting out of yours for a second IQ?” Bill is taller than him like this, just a little, and he’s grinning down at him as if the world is a joke only he can figure out. No, that’s not quite right; because what Ford feels, staring up at him, is that Bill wants _him_ in on the joke as well. 

“I have to admit, I’m still not sure what this is all about,” Ford says. He isn’t sure what to do with his hands, so he presses them against his thighs. 

“Giving you what you want! I thought that was obvious!” 

_Whenever I want you, all I have to do is,_ the radio sings, and Bill’s fingers tighten in his hair and pull, and Ford finds himself tilting his head back to follow his lead. And then his muse has darted forward, pressing their lips together, his stray arm leaving the railing to rest a hand at the small of Ford’s back. He stays stock still, almost afraid to move, too nervous to really enjoy himself. But Bill’s lips are warm and soft, and his touch is strangely grounding while Ford feels like he’s floundering. His muse sidles even closer, slotting a leg between his own. 

When Bill retreats it’s with a grin. Ford is surprised to realize he moved his hands to Bill’s hips at some point, sliding around to the dipping curve of his spin and encouraging him closer. It could be a trick of the light, but Bill’s eyes look like they’re glowing. A warm breeze rustles his hair. It’s like a scene out of a movie. He should be grateful – he _is_ grateful, truly, for this and even more, for everything else Bill has given him. Nevertheless, there is some lingering sense of wrongness about all of this.

They stay for a moment, Bill’s fingers stroking up and down the back of his neck sending endless waves of shivers and goosebumps down his core. And it almost feels possessive, the way Bill remains, for once, in his arms. The way he lets Ford’s hands stay hooked onto his hips. Ford digs his fingers in and leans forward to press chaste kisses along the slope of Bill’s neck. He smells bright and fresh, like rain, like the sharp promise of lightning. Bill laughs and tilts his head to the side, giving him more room.

“That’s the spirit!” Bill says, encouraging. His skin is feverishly hot beneath Ford’s mouth, and Ford earns a shudder out of him when he grazes his teeth over a sensitive spot near his jawline. It’s gratifying. Ford still pulls away. 

“Bill,” he says. His muse opens his eyes and straightens to regard him. A smile plays sweetly across Bill’s lips. There’s a writhing, sinking, twisting feeling in Ford’s chest, but he continues anyway. He says, “this isn’t what I want.” 

A slight furrow develops between Bill’s eyebrows, like he’s not entirely sure what he’s hearing. Ford can understand his confusion – after all, his muse has had to dredge through the slurry of his mind to come up with the skin he’s currently wearing. He even feels unappreciative, rejecting something Bill has crafted for him so thoughtfully. Still, Ford can’t shake the discomfort, that only increases in sharp, exponential lines every time he hears the rush of waves or the creaky-door squeal of a seagull high above. He extracts his hands from Bill’s hips and cups them instead around his cheeks.

“This isn’t the you I want, Bill.”

It’s uncanny, because Bill looks absolutely baffled, and his expression seems like the first genuine one Ford has ever seen. He has no proof of this, just a gut feeling. There’s a rawness to Bill’s perfectly sculpted face that hasn’t been evident previously. And, Ford spies, a light flush has suffused his muse’s cheeks. Ford likes to think that he has caught Bill off guard, and delivered a compliment so unexpected that even Bill - _Bill_ \- could not see it coming. 

And then Bill just bursts into laughter. Howling laughter, like a yelping hyena. Laughter that’s hard enough to make him hunch over, holding onto one of Ford’s shoulders for support. Ford smiles, though he isn’t sure he understands the joke, and pats Bill’s back. He lays his palm flat on Bill’s spine, feeling his chest shaking beneath it. The sensation drives a short, sharp tac into his heart somewhere. It’s been a long time since he has touched another person like this. 

“Wow, Stanford Pines, certified heartbreaker – who knew!” Bill says as he straightens. “Well in that case, go ahead! It’s your mindscape, show me what you want!” It’s fascinating to study how expressive Bill is a human, his mirth and excitement unabashed. Ford is grinning as he watches an apparently great idea flash into his muse’s mind. Bill perks even further and slaps him on the shoulder. “Oh, I know, let’s make it a game! You show me something YOU want, and then I’LL show you something you want!” 

“Don’t you mean something _you_ want?” Ford asks. 

“Isn’t that what I said?” Bill beams and Ford frowns. “I’m like an open book here, Sixer, but YOU’VE got layers!” Ford snorts. If there was one single phrase that could be said to be the least fitting descriptor of his flighty muse, _like an open book_ was a definite contender. “Layers, and repression! And I’m gonna help you shed off both!” 

If Bill thinks he can scare Ford off now, well, he might be right. But Ford can spot a challenge when it’s laid down, and is always willing to rise to the occasion. Ford closes his eyes. His hands are anchoring pinions, clenched to Bill’s hips, as he feels the world drips away like thick, melting wax beneath his feet. It’s his own doing, but it’s still disorienting. When the dizzying vertigo seeps off into the void around them, Ford opens his eyes to the night sky. 

Bill is in his arms, flesh and bone and hot, coursing blood. The reflective light of a million non-existent constellations shimmer dully in his eyes. Above the couple, unseen, a nebula opens its own glowing, consumptive eye. 

“So that’s ONE thing you want, Sixer,” Bill says. He can’t seem to help it, he darts forward and plants a short, sharp peck of a kiss. “Now let’s see one MORE!” 

Bill’s skin unravels like knitted wool unspooling. Globules of waxy human pieces float in the air among the ribbons of flesh. Sharp jags of white, sun-bleached bone are scattered among the refuse. Ford’s stomach roils. His insides feel hot and molten and his skin feels cold, ice cold, and goosebumps prickle across his flesh. There’s a bright, blinding light that Ford is forced to turn away from. He lifts a hand, shielding his eyes. Like the phantom lick of an open flame, his skin heats where the light touches. When he can look again, that light has burned away Bill’s human remnants, and left in its wake is Bill, strange and alien. 

“My turn?” Ford ventures, and watches that eye twitch upwards in what he knows is a smile. 

Arms and arms and arms sprout. They are the creeping black of the sticky night, the spider web in which stars and planets hang. They elongate and curl and pet over him, utterly soft and utterly inhuman. They pull him close. They stroke against his skin, following the straight lines of his bones and the curves of his fat and muscle. They slither between his thighs and cup the backs of his legs. Long fingers encircle his wrists and ankles. Press thumbs into the sides of his throat, rubbing at the ridges of his esophagus and the splayed butterfly of his thyroid.

“My turn,” Bill says next. The hands around Ford stick to his flesh like wet paper and become chains. His arms are dragged behind his back. His legs are bent and rather than floating nebulously, he slams into a hard ground. A collar fits heavy around his throat, tight enough to press bruises against the hyoid bone of his neck when he swallows. 

A violent shudder raises the fine hairs on his body as it clatters down along his vertebrae. An unpleasant – and beneath, a deeply _pleasant_ \- heat suffuses his cheeks and pools low in his organs. Ford’s first reaction is vehement denial. His second, third, and fourth are frantic, pleading, and embarrassed denial. The words rise in the back of his throat like bile, and he can feel them eating away at the back of his teeth in their eagerness to be expelled. 

He chokes them down. The denials and the refutes and the rationalities – all the things that would, at any other time, distance him from these base urges. Protect and shelter him from an outsider’s expected revulsion. The words that are a last bulwark between himself and the world. Ford swallows them back down. He sucks in a great breath through clenched teeth and feels his chest shake. And then he allows his head to hang forward, under the weight of the collar slung around his neck.

Under the greater weight of a muse’s ( _god’s, a god’s_ ) all-seeing eye.

It feels like the universe he has conjured holds its breath as well. 

A hand cards through his hair, fingers crooked and turned so claws drag across his scalp and he shivers. Bill is touching him. No. Not just touching. This isn’t one of the friendly, mindless gestures Bill usually plies him with. Bill isn’t ruffling his hair, his fingers aren’t just running over his skin. He’s being _stroked_ , and it’s insistent, demanding. It’s possessive. 

Bill is petting him. 

A slurry of combative emotions mixes in his chest. But if Ford lets all that go, releases the flotsam and jetsam of his emotional mind…

“Good boy, Sixer,” Bill says. The sound doesn’t seem localized, thrumming deep in the taut membrane of his ear drums. “I think the game’s over, don’t you?” Ford’s eyes are shut – he isn’t sure when they did that. He nods, and wonders which of them won. A hand strokes down his cheek. He turns his head to capture its velvety fingers in his mouth, rolling his tongue across them. Bright laughter bursts around him like super novas. “You know what? Let’s call it a tie.” 

Ford is terrified. His heartbeat is frantic, and some part of him feels it is timed to something outside himself. Not the deep, elongated quivering of the bass notes of the universe, but a high-pitched, shivering thing, full of energy rather than entropy. He doesn’t think of the blackness of night but the radiance of stars, the flare of fusions – he thinks of arcs of heat and light pulling themselves free of a distance sun. Bubbling and boiling hot and brief. The surface below him is firm, the chains around him are grounding. Hands drip over him like ink, slow and staining. 

“Haven’t you always wanted this, Fordsy? Okay, not this scenario specifically, that would be kinda crazy! But you want to be chosen. Noticed. Stand out in the crowd. Wanted above everyone else. Well, guess what, buddy? You got your wish!” 

Hands and heat and stricture. 

“You know how many humans there are on just one planet? A lot! And out of every single one of them, you’re the only one I wanted! The only one CAPABLE enough, SMART enough, DRIVEN enough and- you get the idea, right?” 

Shaking and trembling and pleading.

“Shhh, shhh, you don’t even have to ask for a thing here, Sixer! I already KNOW what you want, right? You don’t have to ask. Haven’t I always given you everything you need?”

Coiling and tightening, grinding teeth and licking tongues. 

“Just like that. You’re it, Fordsy, this is all for you. I’ve said it before – you’re special. I wouldn’t do this for just ANY genius, you know.” 

Something bites his throat and sucks on the flesh clinging to his hipbones. Something claims his mouth and tugs his hair and traces symbols into the skin of his back. Ford recognizes the patterns from their work – Sirius, traced down from either scapula; Polaris, fingers tracking along the indents between his ribs; Algorab, from his floating ribs down to the small of his back, ending a looping circle. 

“See? Even in ways I can’t predict! Even in ways you can’t control, Sixer! Always impressing me, and you don’t even have to try!”

It feels like breath hot and damp on the back of his neck. 

“And there’s only one thing left for you to do for me. Isn’t that right?”

Too much- it’s too much- he can’t-

“LOVE the enthusiasm! Now, come on, Sixer, just like that; come on.” 

And blinding white. Shivering limbs. Only one name on his tongue, stretched and repeated until it loses all meaning, until Ford’s tongue is numb, until his muscle tremble and sag and he is grateful he doesn’t have to hold himself up.

Then nothing.

Then, inexplicably, something.

Ford groans as awareness seeps into his body. His last memories are of the mindscape. Without thinking, he rubs at his neck, where he expects to find crescent-shaped punctures and oval bruises. Little blossoms of erupted capillaries. Instead he finds unblemished skin and tense, knotted muscles. He – his body – is sitting at his desk. His coffee pot sits directly on the table, and has clearly damaged the wood beneath its smooth surface. He reaches out a hand – it’s cool to the touch, and mostly empty.

Everything wars with one another. His mind tells him what aches he should feel – bite marks littering his body like scattered dust, bruises around his wrists and ankles and neck – and his body disagrees. His neck is stiff and his back throbs and it would probably be good to suspend his feet above heart-level for a while. A migraine spasms at his temples with each heart beat. It leaves him disoriented. It feels like there is a time delay between his deliberations and his actions. He tries to pick up a corner of the graph before him and waits, _one-Mississippi-two-Mississippi-three-Mississippi-four_ before he watches his hand surge forth, clumsy like he’s wearing a glove. 

None of it matters.

None of it matters because stretched out before him, with various paperback books stacked up as paperweights, is the diagram. The Diagram. The completed plans. Straight lines and sloping lines, rings within rings all placed together at last. The specs are listed out in a neat table in the bottom right. A helpful scaling guide is drawn next to it in achingly perfect detail. 

This is- this is it. This is what it will be. This is what Ford will build. All the scraps of data, the endless formulas, the equations and numbers and thought experiments – they have all coalesced, finally, suddenly, and just a few months ago, this would have been alien to him. But he knows the symbols that ring around the portal’s entrance, he knows the catalysts and the reactants and the inhibitors he will need to gather to conduct the precisely timed reactions he needs. His hand strokes over the page, delayed and soft and reverent. 

There are not words for how he feels, and for the first time in his adult life, Ford thinks back to the quasi-religious upbringing he’d been reared in. He thinks of the stilted descriptions the angels received, beings at once awesome and awful, beautiful and dreadful, terrific and terrifying. He thinks he might at last understand. The flooding of something larger than oneself. Ford feels lighter, more joyed, more elated and excited and eager than he has ever before in his life. 

And, at the same time, he has never felt sicker. He looks at the schematics, at his life’s work, and his stomach drops and drops like someone has fed him a sphere of dark matter. Panic and despair, because- because-

“Bill,” he says, his tongue thick and numb in his mouth, and he doesn’t wait for the light in the corner of his eyes, or the chiming tone of his muse. “Bill, I can’t build this.” 

“I know you can’t, Sixer!” comes the immediate reply. “But you know someone who CAN!” 

The call is predictably awkward. This is meant in a very literal manner, as Ford had modeled for Bill multiple times over a majority of the last two days using increasingly obscure, complex, and emotionally distressing equations. His muse enjoyed the quantification of human emotions, but not so much the argumentations. According to Bill, there was no one better suited for this work than McGucket, and it couldn’t have just been a coincidence that the universe had plopped a connection like that in Ford’s lap.

_Coincidences aren’t real! Just like consequences! Or TIME! Time Babies are real, though! Unfortunately real._

It isn’t that Ford doubts his muse. He knows – knew – Fiddleford McGucket is talented. If his old college roommate has kept up with his esoteric hobby of building robotic monstrosities, all of which used to run on his own custom-made engines, well, Fiddleford will definitely be up for the task of helping him. Still, the thought of calling him makes his palms sweat and his stomach do flip-flops. Bill doesn’t have any advice for him in this category.

_Look, call your old pal Glasses or don’t! It’s up to you! You’re still gonna change the world, Fordsy! Even if it takes an extra ohh, say, 30 years as you get caught up to where your buddy is now in the realm of mechanical engineering and whirligig-tinkering!_

_I thought you said time wasn’t real, Bill._

_Hey, don’t get smart with me, Smart Guy! Besides, consistency isn’t real either!_

So Ford stalls for a day or two. He obsesses over the design during this time. As though through sheer willpower, or perhaps a heretofore unknown property of osmosis, he could acquire the mastery necessary to build his portal. Or maybe if he flips it upside down, it won’t seem so challenging to complete… hmm, no that makes it worse.

He is too eager to wait much longer. He calls Fiddleford and they make small talk. How have you been? Good. Oh, not much. How’s the family? Ford learns Fiddleford’s father passed about six months back. How’s Elizabeth? She left Fiddleford years ago, but it’s all right – he’s met someone new. Ford and Fiddleford enjoy a brief spat about the future of personal-use-electronics (Ford is certain that it can’t be done, and more certain than ever from his years in this quiet, wooded hick-town that most of the general population will never find a use for a computer). 

And then Ford drops the bomb. 

Well, he carefully lowers the bomb to the ground. 

Ford starts off slow. Brings up theories both of them remember from college. Many of them had been the topic of fierce, late night debate as they sat on one bed together in their dorm room, drinking warm beers because their mini-fridge had been disassembled and reassembled into a machine that passed butter. Fiddleford still has his reservations. He says something folksy about the probability of multiple dimensions existing in the way Ford describes, but Ford can’t make heads or tails of the idiom involved. Something about a possum and a June bug. Fiddleford’s tone, however, is easy enough to read. Skepticism, with an oily patina of _have you lost your damn mind_.

But he listens. His friend listens to him. And that was the hard part, because now Ford eases into the science of the thing. His excitement grows as he speaks and like a plague, he can feel it spread to Fiddleford. There’s the sound of a pen scratching on paper as Ford talks, Fiddleford only interrupting for ask for clarification here and there (pointed, intelligent observations that oh, Ford has missed so much) or to quietly exclaim something about buttering biscuits. The conversation stretches for almost two hours and Ford has only begun to string out the barebones of the operation. 

“You’ve really done this, haven’t you?” Fiddleford asks in a hushed tone. They had fallen silent, Fiddleford staring in something like a blank horror at his crude notes and Ford doing much the same as he flips through notebook after notebook of Bill’s work. 

“I have,” Ford replies. “But I can’t do it alone. Fiddleford, I need your help.”

Fiddleford buys his plane ticket that night.

Ford falls asleep easily that night, awakening into his mindscape. It’s a library without a ceiling, his usual nightscape above. Marble statues, worn white with age, are arrayed in pairs throughout the great hall. Ford notices as he walks along that in each pair – here two lovers sighing, here two men grappling, here two children running – one of the statues is missing its face. Not missing in the sense that there is a blank slate, but missing in the sense of cracked and broken marble. Like their faces have been smashed in a fit of rage. 

Even for Ford, it’s not exactly subtle.

“Bill?” he finally says. He’s staring at the chipped, maimed face of a young man. It looks like someone has taken a chisel to it. The right-angle, staccato wounds remind Ford of a rock quarry he had seen once.

“What?” comes the reply from behind him. Arms wind around his chest. “I’m just saying, not ALL partnerships can be as good as ours!”

Ford laughs, shaking his head. He should defend Fiddleford but Bill is tugging him back now, into a waiting tangle of limbs, and nothing else seems more important.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the fake-out posting of this earlier!


	7. A ghost that the others can't see

His muse is always touching him. 

His muse _has_ always touched him. Casual contact, such as Ford has become used to seeing from the outside. The kind of thoughtless touches that imply closeness and unity. Group belonging. Animals grooming each other, picking through thick fur for bloated fleas. Pets with their lavish and doting affection, butting and nuzzling.

And _claiming_ , he strives to not think.

It’s natural to enjoy these things. Bill’s fingers are electrodes as they leave his skin prickling in their wake, his synapses snapping. His blood rushing to the surface. Gathering. The tingling anticipation when sharp claws ghost just over his flesh. They are black, like ink, like dark matter, like the pooled shadows at the bottom of a staircase. They are sucking and absorptive, swallowing light and reflecting nothing back. The canyon without its Echo, and Narcissus left to his shallow pond.

They skate over him, in this muddled landscape. Nothing holds him down; Ford is left free to twitch and shiver, fighting against the autonomic reflexes that trigger to pull him back from danger. He is supine, his hands are supinated, and long claws tickle at the plump curves of his palm. They follow the ley lines, the fault lines. His mother claimed to read them; to know which led to prosperity and which were at danger of a sudden slip.

Not to mince words, his mother was full of applesauce.

Still, Ford thinks of her, if only through rote association. Bill follows his love line and chuckles at the ineffectual tremor in Ford’s fingers. 

“What do you say? Wanna know your FORTUNE?” A constellation of eyes hang in the air around him. One of them has warped into a mouth, and grins with pearly white teeth. 

“I think I have a pretty good idea of what it is,” Ford replies. A few of the eyes giggle. The mouth licks its lips.

“I BET YOU DO!” 

The claws continue, a stylus skipping across the bumps and ridges of his skin. Bill’s skin – if it could be called that (this is up for debate) – is perfect. Unblemished. Unchanging, unpulsing, unwrinkled. It feels like warm glass in his hands, slender and inhuman limbs he can wrap his fingers around. Delicate, even. Fragile. Bill laughed at him, of course, when he mentioned any of this. 

Three tiny pinpricks when they tap down on his wrist. Ford sucks in air through his teeth, a quiet hiss, and watches delicate beads of blood collect. A thoughtful pause needle-pricked into his skin, three red dots evenly spaced. Needle-pricked into only skin, nestled between blue-green branches of his shallow-running veins. 

“OOPS,” Bill says. “I forget how DELICATE these SKIN SUITS are!” The pad of a thumb swipes across his wrist. His ellipse turned into a faint, tacky smear. The claws return, and Ford’s heart skips a beat as one settles into a little dip near the edge of his arm. Hovering over his pulse point, Bill must have felt it, too. The eyes and mouths are all grinning and Ford squirms, flushed. 

For a split second, the tension wires strung between them are charged with unfamiliar potential. The eyes, with their quivering pupils and fluttering lashes, the mouths spilling with sharp teeth and lolling tongues, the black arms and black hands and black claws – they seem like they aren’t promises anymore, but _warnings_ , and each of Bill’s multiple gazes flit to his face at once. Bill’s finger crooks, like a cobra, like a wasp, like Ford’s one whiplash snap away from poisoned, from exsanguinated, from-

The moment passes. Ford’s breath relaxes out in a long sigh and the claws drag up his arm. It’s almost ticklish. His skin tingles and tightens up into goosebumps, fine hairs rising while Bill’s fingers drag and swirl like they’re caught in the eddies of a great gyre. They could follow Ford’s own currents of darkly deoxygenated blood all the way back to his heart. 

Humans are simply designed for touch. It lowers blood pressure (Ford’s pulse pounds in heady spasms). It reduces heart rate (Bill’s fingers climb, tickle in the crook of his elbow and higher; the rapid beat of his heart climbs in tandem). It stimulates the frontal cortex, that crawling, tickling sensation behind his brow; the same area that is triggered by enjoyable smells, and sweet tastes. 

And touch stimulates the secretion of oxytocin. The big name in this cascade of effects, the bonding hormone. The pleasure hormone, and two palms creep onto his inner thighs. Fingers knead at his muscles. His hips twitch and buck. His legs strain to spread. His mind buzzes, navigating a hot wet fuzz that has draped across his neurons, replaced coherent thought with desire and yearning and _need_. 

“Bill,” Ford says on one panting, huffed breath. 

There are hands all over him now, smooth and warm. Touching him. Dragging through his hair, stroking in long lines down his sides. Ford’s topography mapped out in scintillating detail. Burning parallel lines scratched into his skin by the lightest pressure of nails. One catches across his chest and he jolts in a shudder, a sharp burst of conflicting sensory input. Heat sparks and flares in his gut.

“SIXER! Eyes open, Four-Eyes!” 

The hands are gone. Ford opens to his eyes to a world of static grey. The edges of his vision seem to pulse and seize. 

“Bill?” There’s no sign of his muse, no sign of anything. Not a landscape, not a starscape – nothing but quivering, shaking grey, like Ford’s fallen into the snow between television channels. 

Alone. And exposed. 

“Bill?” he asks again, and his answer is a deep, rumbling brontide. 

The blank world goes clonic in response, jerking fitfully as fat tears begin to rip in the very air around him. The greys and statics being stretched beyond repair, as _something_ looming behind them digs its way through. A brash of ugly, clashing colors is revealed between the splits, protruding like innards from a dehisced wound. Laughter pours of these tears, getting louder and louder as more of the sky ruptures. Most of it is unfamiliar, save for one high-pitched peal. It sets his teeth on edge, hearing it mixed with the caterwauling wails of unknown others. It’s a bore drilling through the hinge of his jaw, a sewing needle piercing through his eardrum-

“TIME’S UP!”

“Bill!” 

Ford awakens tangled in his sheets, with his alarm clock blaring at him and sunlight stabbing at his eyes. He slams his hand down on the clock, sagging back into his pillow with relief as the sound cuts off. The warning tension of a headache lingers at the base of his skull. He groans, throwing an arm over his face. What time even is it? When was the last time he’d set his alarm?

When was the last time he’d woken up in the morning? His schedule has become a disjointed fracture of sleep-wake cycles. AM and PM – what did it matter? Circadian rhythms are for cicadas. It’s a leftover byproduct of a passed over time; the ridiculous part is the way humans cling to it, assign value to night and day and when and where. Why should some things only be done during the day? Why should sleep be confined to night? There are even studies – Ford has read them, he has, he saw them somewhere – about how short bursts of sleep throughout the 24 hour period are more effective. Perhaps more similar to what their ancestors had done, because when you think about it, how does it make sense for an entire tribe of people to be asleep at once? Or to rely on just a few tired, lonely souls to keep them all safe, to serve as vanguards and bulwarks against the threats brought about by thick, seeping darkness? When you _really_ think about it-

His alarm clock rouses from its snooze setting with an ear-splitting blare. Ford’s hand darts out to crush it again. What had he been thinking about? When was the last time he’d set his alarm? _Why_ did he set his alarm? What could possibly have possessed him to plan an interruption to his time with his muse? 

The realization is sudden, but not like a train slamming into him. More like a pillow being lazily tossed into his face. He’s supposed to meet Fiddleford today. 

Of course, they’ve already met. Ford is brushing his teeth, staring at his reflection in the mirror without really seeing it. 

This will be their first meeting in Gravity Falls. Ford’s showering in the blurry world without his glasses. 

Also their first meeting in an uncounted number of years. His glasses are fogged, sitting on the counter after he steps out, running fingers through shaggy hair. The electric razor buzzes in his hand while he shears away stubble. 

The last time Bill was in his body, he left bruises on his forearms. Mottled purple and green, thick pools of blood congealing beneath the skin. Ford shakes his head in wonderment at what his muse could have gotten up to. No true harm done – what’s there will just be recycled back into his body, eventually – but Ford opts for a long-sleeved sweater. 

He leaves the lights on. He leaves the doors open. Bill always turns them all on, opens everything up like there’s a hidden prize somewhere in the cabin. He locks the front door, if only to dissuade any visitors. The bulk of his work has already been moved to his study, sequestered securely behind a code only two beings know.

The drive into town is uneventful. There are trees. There are squirrels. Ford catches a glimpse of some unusual silhouette between the tree trunks. He gives it a cursory glance through his rearview mirror, but he’s already running late. 

People are still eating waffles. The tines of their forks scrape across their plates when they drag soggy bites of the stuff through clinging, stretchy puddles of syrup. Someone is eating an omelet, scratching his knife across shoddy porcelain and then stabbing – _one, two, three; clink, clink, clink_ – for every bite. Background conversations a monotonous buzz, interrupted by barks of jeering laughter. Pieces of meat sizzling on the flattop behind the counter, spitting and hissing akin to the cornered prey animals they were stripped from. Water boiling, bubbling with low-throated gurgles in multiple coffee machines. Florescent lights on and humming like a dislodged hive of hornets. 

Ford feels eyes on him. He half expects to turn and find the slit pupil of his muse looming over his shoulder. He keeps imagining the fluttering insect-skitter brush of lashes across his skin. He catches flashes of gold in his peripheries, twisting around to find nothing more than light glinting off what are undoubtedly fake gold chains and earrings. One memorable time, the spot light glimmer comes off a man’s gold tooth as he throws his head back and laughs, laughs, laughs. Ford watches his throat ripple as he does so, almost convulsively. 

His coffee cup keeps getting refilled. His leg jitters under the table. He keeps checking his watch, because the clock on the wall seems suspended in time, the second hand caught at the _forty-five_ mark. It ticks up and then bobs back down, flittering around the line. The other hands are still, declaring it to be 5:37. His wrist begs to differ, and where the hell is Fidds? Ford thought he was late. 

He got the time wrong. One of them did. Ford assumes it was himself. Or something happened. Fiddleford got lost, his flight delayed. His flight crashed, detoured. It was all a fever dream. Their long conversation nothing more than a preamble, Bill helping his psyche get amped up for an actual, honest-to-Betsy conversation. Or worse, maybe Fiddleford had only been humoring him; had let Ford work himself into excitement over- over speakerphone, or maybe he recorded the whole thing, and now there was a group of people, somewhere, laughing at him-

- _head thrown back and throat, gullet jerking, quivering, gold glinting off a razor-sharp canine_ -

The little bell above the door chimes and Ford jerks. There’s a lanky man with travel-matted hair standing stiff in the doorway, his shoulders slouching in towards each other. His white, short-sleeved and button-up shirt is wrinkled, but there are still sharp creases denoting where it had once been pressed and ironed. Even with his tie loosened around his neck, the top button of his shirt undone, he’s a loose, wiggly tooth among the flannel and jeans aesthetic of the locals.

“Fiddleford!” Ford calls. He stands up, raising a hand, grinning in the face of eyes snapping towards him. Fiddleford smiles as he surges forward, his own hand thrust outward.

“Stanford Filbrick Pines, as I live and breathe!” Their hands meet, and shake. 

They talk over breakfast. Fidds gets a waffle. Ford an omelet. The owner gives them each a piece of pie to go. _On the house_ , with a wink, and they’re left to stare at each other in slack-faced disbelief as she saunters back behind the register. 

“Unbelievable,” Fidds says again, and they’re on the porch, drinking warm beers with some kind of knock-off name like _Budds Rite_. “I cannot be- _lieve_ a city slicker like _Stanford Pines_ ends up in a place like this.” 

Ford scoffs, shaking his head, but really, anyone is a city slicker compared to Fidds.

“I guess the open air did me some good,” Ford says. “Like you always said, huh?”

“Oh, I was full of hogwash.” Fidds waves a hand in the air. “Always think ya got the answers for everything ‘til you’re a few years down the line.” 

Fidds leans over to spit off the side of the porch and Ford takes a swig of his beer. Night is only beginning to settle; the sky is still orange and pink and vibrantly lilac, but the sun has slipped beyond the cover of the trees and stars are peeking shyly between clouds. He smiles, thinking of nights long passed. Hours wasted with the man beside him, mouths chattering a mile ahead of their thoughts, expounding on ideas inspired less by scientific rigor and more by their own egos.

Freshman year, they had jointly ended world hunger, solved tense geo-political arguments, (re)invented perpetual motion machines, and designed a realistic AI that always knew the exact conversational moment to go for a high-five.

Well, theoretically, that is. In practice…

“Hey,” Ford says. “Remember how we almost flunked out of Professor Hilbert’s class freshman year?”

Fidds bolts upright, jabbing his finger in the air, accusatory.

“Now _that_ was some baloney if I ever saw it! What kinda cotton-headed, air-between-the-ears _moron_ grades for _attendance_ at a college?” 

Ford laughs at the well-worn rant, tilting his head back to watch the night sky bleed in from the day’s edges. 

“Well, hindsight and hogwash, right?” Ford offers, and Fidds looks genuinely offended.

“I can own up to my mistakes, Stanford, and let me tell you something right.” That finger is back, pointing at Ford while he struggles for a straight face. “There is _no world_ in which a man should pass all his examinations with flying colors and still be saddled with a 2.5 GPA for the semester!”

“Maybe not here,” Ford says. Fiddleford squints at him. “Not, uh, in this dimension.”

“This your way of getting to the subject at hand?” 

“Uh-” Ford swallows, his ears burning, and Fidds starts to laugh.

“Jesus, Ford, ever the conversationalist.” Ford stares at the piss-yellow ring of beer puddling around the rim of his can. He drums his fingers along the tin. “Ya know, this is why Franchon never called you back.”

Ford gives a startled burst of laughter and then groans. “Oh, Franchon…”

A dancer and a poet, and self-proclaimed philosopher. She was beautiful, not kind, and had a strange intensity to her that Ford had never seen before. And her _favorite_ subject to talk about was _breath_ and _air_ , and the symmetries of nature. That cells could _breathe_ , that you could find one, just one cell in your body, and sync up to it, through meditation.

“What was it you lectured her about again?”

“The Krebs Cycle,” Ford admits, remembering how the light drained from Franchon’s eyes, her gaze distant and glassy. “In my defense-”

“How many diagrams did you draw her?”

“I was trying to _agree_ with her!” A pause. Ford clears his throat. “In a manner of speaking.”

Fidds claps him on the shoulder. 

“I know you’re itching to start – I am too, to be honest. I just need a night to unwind first,” Fidds says. He crunches his empty can in his fist. 

“I understand,” Ford says, and he _does_.

The night air is cool on his face. The slight dampness that he’s learned comes with wooded seclusions, places where life heaves abundantly forward. The porchlight casts a faded pall across the grass, and he can still make out the shape of his car in the driveway. The woods are dark, but they are not silent. Pauses are filled with the stadium echo of chirruping insects, of skittering-pawed nocturnals, of snapping branches and falling leaves. The night sits, still and watchful.

Fidds is next to him. Fidds is _here_. Inside, in his study, are notebooks. Dozens of them. And somewhere below them is a hollowed-out cavern playing host to a growing collection of scrap metal.

He can wait, Ford decides, and tips his head back to finish his drink.

“Of course,” Fidds drawls. “I wouldn’t say _no_ to a little sneak peek at those books of yours…”

They spend the rest of the evening indoors, reading and arguing. Proving and disproving theories as fast as they can be speculated. Fidds will fall intensely quiet, eyes gliding back and forth as he reads, and Ford will grin, knowing what’s coming, ready with a refute for the exact moment that Fiddleford throws the notebook back down and shouts _hogwash_.

Hazy predawn light blossoms outside the windows when Fidds finally ambles off towards the attic, hastily remodeled into a spare room. Ford collapses into his bed, and into sleep. 

He doesn’t dream. Not of anything.

It must be afternoon by the time Ford has peeled himself away from his drool soaked pillowcase. He finds Fidds in the kitchen – in the _clean_ kitchen, with miles of empty counterspace, and the dishwasher quietly churning. 

Fidds is sitting at the table, reading another notebook. He raises his mug in greeting.

“You must have one heck of an electricity bill,” he comments. 

“I wouldn’t know,” Ford says as he pours coffee into a chipped mug. _You’re an all star!_ , the mug assures. “Payments are automatic. Out of the grant money, I guess.” 

“It’s wasteful,” Fidds says, “leaving the lights on all night long.”

Ford frowns, thinking. He’d turned everything off before they went to bed. Well, he’d thought he’d turned everything off, but he had been pretty tired. Exhausted, even. 

“Hmm.” Noncommittal grunting. Fidds shakes his head.

“I’ll build you some solar panels.” 

They’re more subdued below the scalding eye of daylight. Fidds orders him out of the house around three when a cursory glance through Ford’s cabinets and refrigerator reveals condiments, flour, and unexpected mold growing in unexpected places. People stare at him in the streets. They stare at him in the aisles, at the register. Ford almost expects bats to fly out of his wallet when he opens it to pay. 

They stock his pantry together. Fidds makes something or other on the skillet. 

They read. They sleep.

Ford doesn’t dream.

He wakes first in the morning and makes a batch of pancakes from a half-remembered family recipe. They’re a little rubbery. He’d had to turn off lights in every room. He chews, and watches Fidds drown his plate in syrup.

“So,” Fidds says later. He drapes the blueprints across the table. “Where are we supposed to get some of this stuff?” 

“I still have a few things I need to show you,” Ford replies. He waggles his eyebrows. “How do you feel about hiking?” 

_Not great_ is the evident answer across the following days. 

Fidds huffs and puffs along at Ford’s side. Each step is preempted by the thudding jab of his walking stick into packed earth. Fiddleford’s curiosity is hardly dampened by the conditions or environment; Ford is surprised to feel as though he hasn’t talked this much in a lifetime. Conversations on planes outside the physical, solely in one’s own head – those, Ford is realizing, don’t provide the same effect. A silly little idiosyncrasy of the human body, he muses. Tongues flapping, skin slurping, teeth occasionally clacking together. All unnecessary facets of the human experience, but facets none the less. Bill will no doubt find it amusing, that Ford feels amiss without these sensations. Doubly so, that Ford only noticed his discomfort long after the fact. 

Ford has noticed that he hasn’t seen Bill once since Fiddleford arrived. 

Sitting under the tangled canopy brambles, surrounded by the chirping of insects and animals, Ford doesn’t see the stars laid out above them as they make camp for the night. They are out there, of course, seeming to turn in lazy spirals. Twinkling, winking and teasing; diamonds embedded into the velvet ebony skin of the sky. Hiding themselves from his view. Ambivalent towards his very existence. 

Ford doesn’t dream.

They wake and walk and talk. Progress peppered with recurrent pauses for rest and food. For the most part, they avoid the old paths that Ford used to frequent alone, overgrown in his absence. Paths that lead to the nests and dens of what he once considered otherworldly creatures. He knows now, of course, that they are not _just_ otherworldly – they are the lost denizens of other dimensions, spat out between rippling holes in the flimsy material separating universes. 

Still, the weirdness of the world will not be contained. 

He and Fidds are crouched down behind a yawning spray of spade-leaved brushes. A pack – a parcel? Ford hasn’t decided yet – of plaidypuses is… well, not quite frolicking in the swampy clearing nearby. They’re mostly stationary, flat paws and feet slapping in the mud. One of them is rolling back and forth on its back, its toothless bill of a mouth gumming at its fellow’s tail. 

It isn’t that they are dangerous. Not in any sense of the word at all. They _have_ learned to fear humans, however, and while neither Ford nor Fiddleford especially resemble woodsmen, it’s best not to startle them. Ford watches a plaidypus dart its nose into the shallow waters. Is it hunting? He shifts to get a better look, then swallows a sigh as the creature does nothing more than begin to blow bubbles. 

Fidds is squinting intently at the group. His shirt is close to matching their coats, a weird mishmash of red and green and yellow-ish stripes. 

“Is that one there a different sub-species?” Fidds says in a croaking stage whisper. Ford winces at the volume of it, but the herd seems undisturbed. He follows the straight-line pointing of Fidds’ finger to a small lump of brown/red fur gurgling on a grassy knoll.

“What? No, no, that’s just a youngster,” Ford says. “They don’t acquire their vertical stripes until sometime in their adolescence.” He thinks.

Fidds makes a kind of humming noise of ascent. He’s still squinting, leaning forward. A thin, solitary line of sunlight has made its way through the canopy, lands in a ghostly beam to spill across Fidds’ face, the curling ends of his hair turning to gold. Motes and insects glitter into view as they cross its path before drifting off again. In the light, his dark brown eyes are shot through with sparks of honey, his pupil a starkly black pinprick. 

“I think that one’s actin’ strange, Ford,” Fidds says. Too loud again. Ford looks to the creatures. Probably, Fidds is referring to the plaidypus idling on its backside, flappy flipper-like paws waggling in the air. Chewing steadily on its friend’s tail. 

“They’re very simple creatures, Fidds,” Ford says with a chuckle. “I spent a few weeks studying them last summer, and I can assure you, this is all _entirely_ within the bounds of normalcy for this particular species.”

Of course, this isn’t Fiddleford’s field of expertise – or lifelong passion, for that matter. It isn’t that surprising for the mechanist to feel a little wrong-footed. It is endearing, in a way, to see Fidds out of his element. They’re so neck-and-neck in so many other areas. And Ford isn’t too full of himself to be incapable of admitting that, in certain areas, Fidds’ abilities have surpassed his own abilities. That’s the whole reason Fidds is here, after all. 

Fidds hasn’t stopped staring, eyes narrowed suspiciously at the ridiculous little creature in the swamp, and Ford has a sudden desire to show him _everything_ he’s found out here, every strange and marvelous beast that has made Gravity Falls their home away from home.

“So they usually go all grey and blobby-like?”

“Believe me, I’ve seen all there is to see- wait, what did you say?” Ford turns his attention back towards the herd, in time to watch the head of the slow one – the one on its back, chewing on another – finish bubbling outwards, the fur gone from it, the skin looking slick and smooth and bloated, as if it were filled with viscous fluid or puffing up with air. 

“That’s new, ain’t it?” It’s hard to rip his eyes away from the gurgling thing, but Ford manages a glance at his friend – to find him smirking, looking about half the way to an _I told ya so_.

“Fidds, this is no time for-”

They’re cut off by the sudden frantic squawking of the herd. The flip-flopping patter of their flat feet in the mud as they scramble away – away from the grey, now fully grey creature in their midst. Which is chewing something. Ford catches sight of one with an oval chunk missing from the tip of its tail.

“Fiddleford, I believe we may have stumbled upon a new denizen of Gravity Falls!” Ford is patting down his jacket, looking for- for a notebook, a pen, an anything that he can jot observations down with. From what Ford can only assume is nowhere, Fidds has produced a butterfly net.

“I told ya so, Ford.” 

The rest of their day is, technically, as far as progress towards the ship is concerned, wasted. It’s difficult to consider it as such, when they end the day with what appears to be a tiny shapeshifter captured in a hastily-emptied Tupperware container. They poked holes in the top, just in case it needs air. In the shifting shadow-play light of a crackling fire, Ford sketches the weird, bug-eyed creature. 

He lies down in his sleeping bag. Fidds is already snoring away in his own. The embers, sullen and red as they simmer in the remains of their campfire, cast a dull orange light into the tent. Tomorrow, sometime in the afternoon, they should reach the crash site. And then they will really be able to get started. Ford twitches and shifts, unable to get comfortable. Unable to still his hands. Unable to stop his thoughts.

It must be nerves. It twists in his stomach, brings a cool sheen of sweat forth to bead on his skin. He is nervous, of course; Fiddleford will be the first person, not including himself, to see a real, honest-to-Betsy space ship. That’s enough to make anyone nervous.

He can’t see the stars. They’re out there, beyond the canvas of his tent and the interlocking branches and leaves of the forest. Ford closes his eyes. Light plays across the inside of his eyelids. Cells misfiring in the absence of stimulus, creating scintillating circles and starbursts of expanding color. Opens them again, fingers twitching under his covers. Heart thumping in his throat. 

He closes his eyes, into darkness.

Darkness that is wet, and hot, and alive.

It heaves around him, air moving in rhythmic, rushing tides tugged along the wake of a distant and unseen moon. Fluttering, quivering around him, it draws closer and relaxes away, threatening him with touch but never fulfilling its empty promise. Air blows upwards, rustles his hair. His skin feels clammy, feverish in its wake. The darkness huddled close with radiant heat. Cool air rushes down, the darkness pulling back. A chill settles, icicles snapped off a dribbling branch and driving spikes into his bones.

Ford can’t see. Air swirls around him. He thinks he’s probably floating.

“Bill?” 

It is wet, like the inside of a lover’s mouth. Slick, slippery. Yielding, flushed flesh, engorged tissues, and around every bend, hiding beneath a veil of smooth invitation: a curving band of sharp, white teeth. Ford looks into the darkness, eyes straining for a flash of light. 

“Where have you been?” he asks. 

The air draws in, cool and biting, and then stills. Things in the darkness shake and quiver in unknown patterns. Pulsate and pound and thrum. Surge. He thinks, perhaps, that floating was not the right word. He feels dangling, somehow, limpid and stringless. Warm air gusts upwards again, as if he is inside some mighty bellow as it breathes. 

“Eh, CLOSE enough!” 

“Bill!”

There is white light, a singular line spreading like fire engulfing a taut string, branching off at its ends to form his muse’s familiar shape. Such things always come in threes. An eye, a tie, a hat. Legs and arms and cane. Behind Bill, in the gauzy light he casts, Ford can see the hint of walls. Glistening and elastic. Spreading away, then drawing, shrinking closer. He strains to get a better look, squinting around blinding yellow and then-

And then, his muse is touching him. Hands on his cheeks, squishing his face. 

“Hey Fordsy,” Bill says, body winking and sputtering in time to his words. “I got a QUESTION for you!” 

Ford swallows, hands curling at his sides. 

“Uh, yes?” 

“Would you consider yourself to be… boring?” Bill flutters his lashes; the ghostly contact makes Ford squirm. “You know, like a BORING kind of person?”

Ford’s cheeks blaze beneath his muse’s hands. Air drags downwards around the both of them. 

“Uhh.” Ford clears his throat. 

“A STICK in the MUD!” Bill clarifies, dropping his arms and drifting backwards. When the air sucks in, flowing downwards, the heat of Bill is like the sun glowing on his skin. The dank, hot air misting around them obscures this effect.

“Well…” His mind is plagued with jeers, old and frail and well maintained. Classmates from every school year, girls who turned their noses up at him, boys who shoved him in the dirt. The thumping bass of a party nearby as Ford laid curled with a book on his bed. 

“A NEGATIVE NANCY – or NATHAN, your PICK – a NINCOMPOOP, an EGGHEAD – well, actually, you ARE one of those -” Bill counts each one on his right hand, sprouting new fingers as he runs out – “a SNORE, a SNOOZE, a WET BLANKET-”

“No!” Ford snaps his jaw shut, startled at the fervor of his claim. “No, Bill, I’m not.” 

Bill’s eye is wide, his pupil depthless. It is times like these that Ford remembers what a pupil _is_ , anatomically speaking – a hole through which light might pass, a chasm in which one might fall. Depthless. And it draws to mind not the living, heavy darkness around them, but something colder, emptier. The space between stars, the black hole that peaks through the gaps in Bill’s teeth, can be spotted yawning above the languorous curving of his tongue. 

Bill’s eye is wide, and then it is not. It’s curving and amused, a playground bully’s sly smirk. Except, well, Bill is no bully. The extra fingers he grew shrivel and curl and fall off. They flake into thin, crumbling fragments and then disappear into dust. 

“EXACTLY! Stanford PINES is no slouch on the creative and DARING front!” A spark lurches its way down Ford’s spine. The heat in his cheeks doesn’t lessen, but feels less scalding all the same. Bill flickers out of existence, reappears at his side with an arm tossed across his shoulders. “SO THAT LEAVES me WONDERING... why the skin suit?” 

Ford is caught off guard, by the question as much as the unnatural way Bill’s arm stretches so he can flick him on the nose.

“Wh… what do you mean?”

“I MEAN, Sixer, this is YOUR dreamscape – anything’s possible, right?” Bill’s gone from him, his shoulders cold in his muse’s absence. 

To tell the truth, Ford hasn’t considered this before. Conjuring things – creatures, landscapes, items – sure. It seemed only natural, to one who was so used to the desire to shape the world. Here, Ford could literally leave his handprint on the scientific world, etch his name into the buildings that shunned his presence in the waking world. 

But to change _himself_. Ford raises his hands before him, gaze flitting across his palms as his mind whirrs ending. It seems so fundamental. His body is _him_ , after all.

“Not REALLY!” Bill pipes up. His muse is in front of him again. “I mean, I DO IT all the TIME!” 

It’s almost grotesque to watch Bill’s shape as it bubbles and curves and expands, colors shifting. In no more than the blink of a few eyes, he travels through: a deer, a human, a hawk; becomes Stanford Pines for a split second, before his lines condense and straighten again. Ford’s stomach roils, his skin cool and everything inside it feeling molten. Bill expands – adds a third dimension, his color deepening to a vibrant red. The color of bitten lips or burned, eroded skin. The bright burst of arterial blood. 

The color of a carnation when it is used to signal love. Bill rolls his eye. 

“SEE? Still 100% BILL CIPHER, RIGHT?” Ford nods, though he’s somewhat lost the string of their conversation. This new form of Bill’s has his muse segmented into three pieces, lined with long, curving teeth and dribbling tongues that sweep in languid strokes through the air. It’s almost an inversion – his pupil a glittering gold protuberance from the black tar of his sclera. Gold to match his limbs and, Ford smiles, his hat. His _extra_ limbs, with hands that quiver and clench in the air asymmetrically. 

“Right.” Ford’s mouth is dry. 

“So why don’t you GIVE IT the ole COLLEGE try, huh? Let’s see what STANFORD PINES looks like in his WILDEST dreams!” Two of Bill’s bottom tongues are sliding around each other, coiling like a caduceus. A bright burst of Bill’s laughter snaps him out of his staring.

“Shapeshifting!” Ford blurts out, much his own chagrin. He clears his throat, and tries again. “Uh, I’ll give it a try Bill.”

“It’s pretty INTUITIVE once you get started!” 

Ford nods again, frowning. _Intuitive_ hardly seems like a word that could be applied to something as astounding as manipulating matter. And _getting started_ seems like the most challenging aspect. He closes his eyes, taking in a long, slow breath. Exhales just as slowly, feels his racing heart begin to drag down as well. Tries to focus his awareness to the sensations of his body. The physicalities that aren’t _really_ physical, here. The dampness on his skin when air gusts upwards. The arrangement of his limbs, on his body, and their relation to one another. Their relation to the outside world, which is harder when one’s floating in empty space. 

Breathes. And tries to picture himself, reimagined. Changed. New. Thinks of Bill many months ago now, when his arms had formed a rippling cascade of after-image multitudes. Had pulled him in and pressed against him and held him, hard, against living gold. Something along his chest feels fuzzy and warm, and then, dizzyingly, there. 

“Extra ARMS? Not exactly INNOVATIVE, but not bad for a first try!” 

Ford’s eyes jolt open and his gaze darts to what are, yes, extra arms. Another set just below his original, nearly identical to the top set. And almost effortlessly, they move. He _moves_ them, as if the tract for their nerves has always been laid. The neural bumps and ridges in his brain always in existence, and Ford laughs aloud at the ease of it all. How natural it feels.

“Bill! This is incredible!” He interlocks four sets of fingers, claps them together, gives himself two fist-bumps. Thinks of all the use he would get out of them, how many more notes he could write down in the moment of discovery, when his thoughts fly so much faster than his body can move. 

“YUP!” 

And he could do more. He could _be_ so much more in here! His thoughts drift towards the shapeshifter he and Fiddleford had found – does it feel the same way he does right now?

“Actually, that little PEST you two stumbled upon today is what brought all this to MIND!” Bill says, pricking the delicate bubble of Ford’s thoughts. “Figured if you found THAT so interesting, you might wanna give it a SHOT yourself!”

“How… you know about that?” Ford asks. “You weren’t there, were you? I haven’t seen you in days…” His chest aches a little, his elation deflating.

“Aww, Fordsy, no need to feel GUILTY! I’m in your MIND, remember?” The environment is suddenly, abruptly different. Ford’s feet hit the grassy ground with a firm thud. He stumbles under the weight of his own body. “And I’m ALWAYS WATCHING!” The bark on the trees surrounding him splits, eyes appearing scattered over their surface like boils and blisters. Ford’s heart gives a lurching beat. 

“You’ve been with me? All this time?” And he’d been feeling so… alone. 

“WELL DUH! ‘Til the end of TIME, right pal?”

“’Til the end of time,” Ford agrees. 

The rest of the night passes swiftly, and Ford finds himself baleful of the hazy morning light. Fidds is whistling outside the tent. Some kind of meat is sizzling over a brand-new fire. 

“Ford? Ya up in there?” Fidds calls to him, and continues after Ford’s grunt of assent. “That shapeshifting fella of ours got out in the night! Musta figured out how to make itself little.” There’s a thoughtful pause, during which Ford can’t help but smile up at his tent as he pictures his friend stroking fingers along his own chin. “Dang clever of him.”

The day spends itself quickly as well. They descend into and emerge from, bruised but victorious, the still intact insides of an ancient alien space craft. The sun is all but set by the time they have staggered free of its hatch, a massive pack of rare and precious metals hanging from each of their backs. They make camp up on that grassy knoll, let the ruddy orange red of the sunset fade out like a curtain being drawn.

They’re sitting side by side, eating beans out of tin cans. Not by necessity, but by choice – Fiddleford insisted a camping trip wasn’t a camping trip until someone had eaten some beans out of a tin can. They’ve been quiet for a while. The thrill of their day draining, their limbs turning heavy and leaden as they creep towards exhaustion.

“You seem different,” Fidds says. Spoons a spoonful of beans into his mouth.

“Different?” Ford isn’t nervous. He very casually stirs his own spoon. “How so?”

“Mmm.” Fidds swallows. “It’s hard to say. You seem more… self-assured. Calmer.” There’s a pause. “Happier, I think.” 

Ford lets go of his spoon to drape his arm on the crook of his knee. He out across the valley, at the twinkle of lights in the town spread before them. The high cliffs, broken decades ago by technology that even now, humans can’t fully comprehend. And above them all, the clear black blanket of the night sky keeping its silent watch. The stars, white and glinting, all look like eyes to him.

“You know what?” Ford finally says, and resumes eating. “I think you might be right.”


End file.
